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Survery Final Day (DoW4??)
DaDokisinX
Clickbait title aside, the final question of the DoW servery asked us what advice we would give to Relic if they made a new DoW game. Also, they asked what a future DoW game should deliver.
Before you trolls and DoW3 haters have to grab that tissue, I don't think this is confirmation that DoW3 is no longer going to be supported or that no expansion is being made. Based on the wording of the survey, it could be referring to future expansions. Either way, I wanted to start this thread before some weirdo beat me to it. I personally replied saying something that amounts to "RTS is dying, make a game that is _extremely _innovative and maybe one not even like an RTS in order to make a future DoW fresh and exciting, and one that can capture many new fans."
What are you thoughts?
Comments
salvasc
It refers to future Dawn of War games, so they do not specify. The reading that is given to all this, and after asking about the elements and mechanics of the game, that they will produce some expansion and do not want to make mistakes again.
It is a market study and if function is to tempt future buyers to determine if it is feasible or not to invest in a business determining.
Guziol
They need to assure people that this is in fact not a MOBA. Maybe in the expansion trailer just have a giant MOBA sign being crushed by deamon or a necron. Then setting it on fire and then pissing on it.
Draconix
Speaking of Dow4, I don't think that Relic will now start to make that game while abandoning Dow3, because, think about it, that would be so weird to quickly start a new Dow4 game a few months later after Dow3's release. Not to mention that Dow3 didn't gotted own expansion yet. Dow4 might be nice, but I actually want to see expansion for Dow3 first.
I wish to expansion for Dow3 come true, even if it not possible. But I can dream of that.
Amoc
People are way too hung up on the label. It really doesn't matter. While the game is definitely an RTS, the heavy MOBA influence can't be denied. Too many people tried the game and walked away for this to have been a primarily marketing or image problem either.
Stoner
@DaDokisinX
"RTS is dying, make a game that is _extremely _innovative and maybe one not even like an RTS in order to make a future DoW fresh and exciting, and one that can capture many new fans."
Seriously, man? They tried TWICE, maybe best thing to do would be NOT to make something very innovative and stick to the old ways, to give people features and flow of gameplay they loved from previous titles? Because, you know, RTS is pretty conservative genre...
Katitof
I guess its pretty safe to assume that whoever said "moba" in any kind of context during pre release interviews pretty much opened flood games for all the drones repeating it mindlessly.
Creature
Yup. And unfortunately. I think Relic gets it now, but that horse is gonna keep getting beaten. Now we're just beating the ground where it's corpse used to be, before it was smashed to infinity and its blood drained fully into the soil.
Guziol
The fact that survey for closed beta had a question "How much experience you have had with MOBA genre?" existed did not help eaither. This was one of the first points where massive shitposting started.
Amoc
Except they said it and then proceeded to deliver an RTS that feeds off of a ton of obvious RTS influences. How is referencing "reality" mindless?
Katitof
That's bulls*it argument right there.
CoH2 is being played by exactly the same people who played CoH1.
It doesn't grow, because its population always was attached to the game and never left it in the first place, its the best WW2 RTS out there AND on top of that, WW2 setting is overwhelmingly more popular then 40k in PC gaming.
Go on and show us any RTS released over last 5 years that wasn't considered dead within 3-5 months.
You won't find it.
You know why? Because RTS genre is on decline just as much as MOBA genre is on growth.
MrBenis
I'd kind of like a new DOW1 style game. Decompress the focus on heroes from DOW2/3 and get back to having large armies crashing in to each other.
Or don't. Maybe it's better to remake DOW1 with all the shiny graphics of 3( and some higher quality audio would be really nice). And don't hamfist it either, go big, have 4 races at launch and just release the others as they get a visual overhaul. I'd pay for that, I think. Not to say that DOW1 is especially ugly or that DOW3 is especially nice looking but I do kind of miss the grittiness of DOW1 models in that larger-than-life way everything was done.
I've always said that DOW3 was an OK, 6/10 sort of game, buy it for $30 but nothing more. It just never had enough OUMPH to grab me by the sack like the first game did. At the time of speaking I dropped 113 hours on DOW3... compared to the 2000+ I did on DOW1.
Wikkyd
Total war warhammer? Xcom2? Xcom 1?
PhilthyPhilPhD
@Wikkyd
You're calling XCOM an RTS ? Do you know what RTS stands for? It stands for real-time strategy, as in you command guys in real time. XCOM is turn based. Total war can perhaps be argued to be an RTS, except for the fact that most of the gameplay is on the campaign map, and is again turn based. The actual fights can be autoresolved and are thus not integral, on top of that you can actually PAUSE in the middle of the combat. Calling it and RTS is a bit of a stretch.
Katitof
Not RTS, not RTS and not RTS.
Lockerd
All of those had massive marketing budgets I might add, and teams which were probably 2-3x larger than any the DoW or even any modern RTS games have had.
I hate even admitting it, but most of the RTS games that built the genre have been on the decline, it's either you take a mix-match game and promote it to success...or you try to basically polish a stone and get some fair value out of it. RTS games as we used to know them just don't sell well anymore, grey goo was a perfect modern polish on an established RTS formula...and it's dead (its prequel style campaign didn't help).
Then there are games like sins of a solar empire, Spellforce, and Homeworld 2, which were the only REAL advancements on the RTS genre in a long while...and that's just in terms of success. But then games like Stellaris come out and basically say "++heresy redacted++ the old things, let's get fresh" and broke the boundaries of what people expected, and now people expect something on the same level of those games, unfortunately it's how progression works.
DaDokisinX
To clarify my advice toward relic:
I really do think RTS is dying. The people that play strategy games, and particularly RTS games, are PEANUTS compared the number of gamers that play MOBA's or Shooters. There is no comparison to be made imo. Plus, the trend only continues to show players fleeing the genre, as the only ones that keep playing it are the people who have been playing RTS for 10+ years. I doubt there are many kiddos picking up RTS games. All the RTS games combined only hold a fraction of what these games hold. I did write ups on this before, but the evidence is clear based on consumer preference in what types of games they choose to play.
Simply remaking DoW1 as a lot of the old dogs on this forum seem to want would technically be feasible, but it would only please a very niche part of the market right now. The huge fans of DoW1 are an aging playerbase, and I doubt a simple remake of a "classic" RTS game will attract any new blood into the franchise, which should be a core marketing plan for any business/franchise if they want to keep it going. I think DoW and 40k in general really needs an injection of new blood,
Thus, when I mentioned Relic should innovate, I did not mean in the same degree in which they did for DoW3 (which was only sort of innovative). I mean they need to make something that no one will even see coming, so that it is almost nothing like it's previous games. This is why I said maybe even leave the core of RTS games behind in the next one. DoW, and the 40k IP as a whole, is going to need a huge facelift in order to capture the success of the past.
DaDokisinX
I mean, pretty much all the "fans" of DoW abandoned all their games when newer ones from competitors came out (MMO's, MOBA"s, etc.). Clearly simply remaking RTS's in some form is a losing battle, especially from a business standpoint (even the mighty Starcraft is on life support, and the pro scene is pretty much dried up there). No one really cares what RTS's "stand for" (whatever that means) except for a few old dogs that grew up with these games in the early 2000's, and probably have more pressing IRL issues than video games for the most part. I love RTS's too, but I'd rather be playing a popular game all my friends will like playing at times as well. I get it, we like strategy games, but I think DoW/Relic/40k should try and branch out in new directions.
Sooo, I don't think it's an unreasonable suggestion.
steinernein
World in Conflict + 40k.
Make it easy for people to join or leave games even if there are games in progress.
Lockerd
I generally have to agree here, as much as I like Dawn of War 3, it's just not doing the franchise justice by trying to bring the old RTS formula and merge it with some very scant and cut down features of modern strategy games.
I'd go bigger, I'd combine World in Conflict, Dawn of War, Stellaris, and some aspects of Xcom 2 (think equipping battlebarges, companies, etc).
I'd like to come up with something badass...but it's not gonna be liked by all.
Wikkyd
You are asking for way too much at that point. You're asking for 3 different games, even 4, to be merged into one.
Stoner
What DaDokisinX says, it makes sense from certain point of view, but realistically I don't think it's a truly best path for Relic to take. Innovations are great and almost always welcome in any genre, let alone RTS, but, as you guys suggest, merging WoC, Stellaris and something else into the mix ISN'T innovation, it's just same mashup what Relic attempted with DOW III. And another reason why I think it's unwise to take this path, because from both latest DOWs, it's pretty obvious that either no innovation can even theoretically work, or Relic is simply unable to produce something new and highly attractive at the same time. Even if we consider it, can anyone propose real working solutions as to how to design next DOW which, again, isn't anything like previous games but will have massive appeal? We WILL need massive appeal, because, again, it will miss old DOW fanbase. I honestly can't think of any recipe that can work with 100% guarantee. Can you?
Now, I have to fully disagree with statements that RTS is dying genre in our day and age. This genre was NEVER even close as popular as any 3D Action, Shooter, Fighting, Racing or even Sport Sims. People keep playing such titles as SC, WC, C&C, AoE, CoH and etc because there are simply no any high quality-mass appeal RTS games being made in all these years. Some folks say stuff like Normandy, Men of War or Blitzkrieg are fails, which doesn't make any sense. These games targeted at tiny, niche audience, and these niche groups dig it. I don't think any developer in his right mind can expect that one of these can ever become more popular than CoD, don't you think?
Market is there, no doubt about it. Marketologist doomsayers have been saying same thing about cRPGs some 10 years ago, that modern consumer is interested only in mindless blockbusters such as ME or FO3 f.e., but they were wrong. There are lots of new, outstanding, classic isometric, even 2D RPGs which get high praise, great sales and demand. And there are not so good ones too, which fail and get honest bad reception.
CoH2 holds sufficient number of playerbase and has healthy community, same can be said about SC2. If DOW III had a bit different design, had more content and was more polished, it would easily have even bigger appeal. I can bet my money on that if devs go for specific rework, and that doesn't need to be something radical, just cut/tone down stuff most people are unhappy about and add/tweak something that can realistically be added/tweaked for game to be felt more like original with merged new (current) mechanics into it, than do smart re-launch with new trailers and stuff. I'm sure it will explode. We don't need tens of thousands to be constantly online, same amount of players as CoH2 has would be more that enough for healthy playerbase, and it is easy to achieve it.
People disregard Total War examples too much, but title is old, barely seen any innovation at all, and CA doesn't care about things like: "how do we get kids who play F2P titles to massively buy and play our game?" Answer is: you can't. You need to target different audience, even if its smaller and won't net you billion $$$ revenue in first month, at least it won't be hanging around 300 players for MP focused title on weekend for game released some 3-6 months ago...
Wikkyd
I don't know, the appeal of starcraft and company of heroes far outweighs the appeal of Dawn of war, sure it could get up there after some time, but I have a hard time believing it could beat SC2 in less than a year.
wongtp
this and just this.
this game lacks polish & content, from a perspective of team games.
theres no need for super innovative implementation. look at what it brought us, a dying bastard misshapen game when they tried to force moba elements into rts, did not even come close to working. what the game needs now is the kind of thought and polish that was given to vcoh.
target tables, damage and armor types are far too simplified. there's no tier 2 line infantry that can really shake up the monotony of fights mid game unless you have elites can be easily destroyed by focus fire from the things that they are supposed to counter because you can only have 1 of them. leading to huge spams of tacs/devastators/lootas/shootas/snipers/guardians/dark reapers.
there's no middle ground heavy infantry to be able push against that kind of spammed firepower while being able resist anti tank fire by having a small target size, because the system now only has 3 armor types, 3 damage types and all weapons have 100% accuracy against all targets. this kind of system make certain units obsolete after a certain time frame passes and limits the choices players have especially in late game where only anti tank infantry are spammed together with walkers/elites. no more t1 infantry.
next, we have setup teams that have 360degrees arc makes ranged infantry obsolete as their main advantage is their mobility. set up teams have longer range, better dps and can easily turn to shred incoming infantry in a heartbeat. however, im not say that they are OP, what i meant is they are far too superior compared to regular infantry and thus makes them obsolete.
with so many units becoming obsolete due to hard counters and bad implementations of setup teams, this leads to the same boring game we see over and over again through the matches. where players are funneled into using the same strategy and units to win the game. spam the ++heresy redacted++ out of this unit Y, wait for a certain tech/elite, push during this time. to counter that. spam the ++heresy redacted++ out of that other unit X that hard counters unit Y. its boring, its a mathematical formula and its what that is killing the game.
there's no wildcard in the game, randomness from tactical choices that can break this formula into pieces and force players to think and prepare in advance. there's not a certain time where a group of tacs alone can overrun a loota/darkreaper/devastator position of similar numbers using flank tactics, superior positioning and grenades, instead either spam snipers or asm instead and stop building tacs.
DaDokisinX
RTS is more popular than racing games btw, at least "Strategy" is, and the "not even close" claim in relation to racing is not accurate. Just saying.
Also, 10+ years ago before the rise of MOBA's and MMO's, RTS was by WAY more popular among gamers. They were so big that they dominated almost all the "pro" scenes back in the day. I really don't know who you can make the claim that RTS hasn't lost a huge amount of prestige and popularity over the past 10+ years. Just ask people you know, many will say that they played Wc3 or SC, or C&C back in the day, but now they do not even touch RTS games. I mean what happened to all of them if RTS is not on the decline? Where did the hundreds of thousands of DoW1 and SC players go? Are they just so spoiled that they can't play any less than perfect and fun RTS game anymore? And even if you are right, this just means that RTS will forever be a near irrelevant genre (in which case huge funding for RTS games and more than 1 company even bothering to make them (relic) will soon be a thing of the past).
steinernein
RTS genre rose probably because neckbeards had nothing else to play other than Civ. As the population aged and went from SC1 to beyond, most of them realized how much time and effort with little to no pay off RTS games offered so they dropped off.
RTS genre is in decline because there's no such thing as a casual RTS; the amount that an individual has to learn and go through is pretty ++heresy redacted++ high to reach average competency. It's stressful, it's overwhelming, and the community support behind it isn't that great. Furthermore, you're most likely doing it alone since team games aren't the accepted standard. It's also difficult to make all aspects of the game watchable.
So yeah, ++heresy redacted++ them, combine WiC + 40k, make it stress free to enter or to leave, and make team games the standard rather than 1v1.