ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT

As every reader of this blog surely knows, twenty long days have passed since F2P was due to launch in Europe, and we still seem no closer to a resolution. Codemasters is maintaining the kind of total, sweaty silence characteristic of a wounded WWII submarine lying in shallow waters with a couple of destroyers cutting capers just above it on the surface. Meanwhile, the forums are staggering under the weight of concerned, miserable or frantic players pleading, screaming, roaring, threatening or just plain doing their best to start a reasonable, sophisticated man-to-corporate-entity-type dialogue. That last gambit doesn't work, and I suspect it never will.

Why not? Well, I believe it's pretty clear by this time that there is no insurmountable technical problem stopping the launch. The basic code is obviously reasonably solid (OK, OK, I said reasonably, not perfectly), or otherwise the stateside servers would have collapsed. I also no longer think it can be a specifically Turbine-to-Codemasters transfer problem such as different accounting systems and their interface with the in-game shop, because that would have been fixed by now (unless the entire technical staff of CM is permanently on drugs, which I beg leave to doubt). Also, CM representatives, on their increasingly rare appearances on the forums, are limiting themselves to making gagging noises and jerking their heads back at the front office; translation, "I can't say a word about this or my employment prospects will do a China Syndrome".

What all this spells to my experienced and cynical mind is one word only: lawyers! I have no shred of evidence, of course, but the only reasonable explanation I can think of for this ongoing and open-ended delay, a delay with inevitably serious (maybe even disastrous) financial consequences over time for both CM and Turbine,  is serious legal problems of some kind. Maybe it's between the two companies, or perhaps it's something to do with some unsuspected pitfall of European law; perhaps the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg has decided it wants to levy purchase tax on in-game transactions, or else F2P contravenes some article of the European Union legislation on the free movement of goods and services. Perhaps. All I can say is that if this supposition is true, it could be bad news. Because geological time and the slow shifting of tectonic plates are as sheet lightning compared to the average speed of corporate lawyers...

SWINGS & ROUNDABOUTS

With mounting worries about the LOTRO’s future after the Warner Bros buyout, allied to speculation about Turbine’s financial health (WB wouldn’t have bought it if it wasn’t profitable or it wouldn’t have been sold if it was in good health – take your pick!), there has been a marked tendency for observers, educated and otherwise, to ascribe the apparent decline in the game’s quality over the last year to the lifetime subscription experiment. While conceding the value of the original financial shot in the arm during LOTRO’s early days, the argument goes, we lifetime subscribers are now parasitic on the game, contributing nothing to development. Indeed, some forum posts have suggested, lifetime subscribers are largely responsible for the current doldrums. By the same token, many lifetimers moan that for these reasons, Turbine regards them as less that the dust on its feet, and completely fails to take their interests to heart – the not illogical implication here being that this particular group of players is more likely to be picky and demanding.

I say that’s rubbish. It’s true that lifetimers no longer pay a monthly subscription; on the other hand, this scenario completely ignores the crucial fact that lifetime subscribers actually represent a large and essentially captive pool of customers for paid expansions. Let me put it this way: say that a monthly subscriber, cheesed off by the paucity of content since Vol. III/Book 1 was released earlier this year, decides to cancel his subscription on 1 May. From this point on, both the lapsed subscriber and a lifetime subscriber are contributing the same amount to Turbine’s kitty, namely nothing. However, let’s be optimistic and say that on 1 November, Turbine release a wonderful new boxed expansion, with a new landmass and even (as long as we’re dreaming) a fully revised LI system, retailing for about 30 euros. My guess is that at that point, the vast majority of lifetime subscribers, even those who perhaps haven’t logged on since early summer, will fork out for the expansion – after all, the game hasn’t cost them anything for over half a year, and what’s more, there is little or no hassle involved. However, what are the chances that lapsed monthly subscribers will do the same, given that just buying the box won’t be enough – they’ll also have to go to the trouble and expense of re-subscribing?

Lifetime subscriptions may or may not have been a good thing for Turbine from an actuarial point of view; that depends very much on the specifics of the company’s financing and accounting. But I don’t believe that ongoing financial problems, if any, can be ascribed to the existence of lifetime subscribers; if we don’t pay for the swings, we pay for the roundabouts, and we mostly do so quite happily.

RADIANCE GATING: THE ISSUE THAT WON'T GO AWAY

I mentioned in my previous post that I considered radiance gating (i.e., making raids accessible only to those who have acquired radiance gear) a very poor design decision, and added "it’s no secret most players feel the same way". That was, actually, a bit of an understatement... Gating has provoked perhaps the most extensive debate ever on the LOTRO forums, and has met with almost universal disapprobation. The "Petition against the new Raid/Radiance system" started by Cuilion on the CM forums way back in February has achieved an astonishing 32,591 views and garnered 650 replies, virtually every last one supporting the petition. This is no simple storm in a teacup.

Cuilion started his petition in response to an uncompromising official announcement from Turbine to the effect that "Radiance will continue to be an important gameplay mechanic going forward for Raids. In other words, given the amount of time and energy gone into making the Radiance system it's safe to assume Radiance gear will be required for future Raids." Well, there's certainly no ambiguity there. Problem is, everyone hates radiance gating, and this includes dedicated end-content raiders (of which I suppose I am one, albeit not an obsessive example of the species). The question here is to what extent do, or should, the developers of an ongoing game like LOTRO pay attention to the wishes and preferences of their client base? OK, it's obvious you can't please everyone, and that whatever the developers do or don't do, some categories of players will always be outraged; the minor storms which break out after every adjustment of class skills (necessitated by a sensible desire to provide a level playing field) are a classic example. Every class of player will defend their territory to the death, and complain accordingly - that's only to be expected. The same goes for many of the lore-breaking design decisions: to coin a clumsy phrase, you simply cannot make a MMORPG omelette without breaking lore eggs.

What we have here, though, is very different from the usual forum whine-fest. Players who are serious about the game, who are experienced gamers, who wish LOTRO and Turbine the very best and who have given considerable thought to the subject have expressed their opposition clearly and unambiguously: they believe radiance gating to be a design error, a one-way-street which will harm the game and its prospects in the medium to long-term. They have done so, by and large, in a restrained fashion, explaining exactly why they believe this to be the case. Unfortunately, there has not been the slightest indication from Turbine that this wave of sober criticism is regarded as anything more than a minor irritant.

Politics teaches us that when a substantial (and vocal) percentage of any population has a serious beef which is consistently ignored by the powers that be, conspiracy theories will spring up like weeds to explain an apparently irrational situation: "If They won't even admit there's a problem, then something is rotten in the state of Denmark...". A recent post by player Mai Hon encapsulates this view perfectly: "I had two accounts, I waited for some sign that someone at Turbine was listening to the outcry against radiance, but its someone's favourite child, someone who would rather see the game damaged by the division it causes than admit it was a mistake."

And in view of Turbine's deafening silence, who's to say that Mai Hon is wrong?

BOOK 13, NOT...

As every LOTRO player in the world not actually in hibernation knows by now, Book 13 has been released in the USA in time for the game's first anniversary - but not in Europe. The results on the Codemasters forum have been explosive: by just before midnight (server time) on Thursday, the day on which most people expected the patch to be released, a thread on the subject had attracted a record 27,387 views as well as 425 responses - also an absolute record. More than a few people were pretty clearly upset.

At 7.30 pm, Satine came up with Codemasters' excuse: "... we will not be getting Book 13 tomorrow. And no, it's not because the localisation isn't done! We haven't yet received the "Release candidate" for testing therefore at the very earliest we'll get Book 13 onto the live servers will be late next week some time, but if we find anything wrong with it during testing, it'll be later still... Up until now we've prided ourselves in getting almost every update to you just one or two days after the US however on this occasion we haven't been able to do so".

Responses in the forum tended to divide between those calling down divine retribution on Codemasters and/or Turbine for not delivering at the (implied) time, and those who pointed out that there may even be advantages to showing a bit of patience; as "hitchhiker 54" remarked, "Think of it this way... The US get the patches first. They have since beta, which may seem unfair.... BUT (and this is my favorite bit) the US players find all those little bugs that get past test server! By the time we see the patch Turbine are already working on any issues. So... before another 'it's not fair' post goes up, please consider. Would you rather we did final beta test or have a couple of million Americans do it for us?"

Others were devastated, and didn't care who was to blame: "This really, really, really, really sucks!! I just have holiday, and hoped we'd get book 13 during my holiday, but it seems not...". By and large, however Turbine came in for heavy flack for treating Europe as as second-rate market, while for their part Codemasters got a fair bit of stick for, if nothing else, failing to keep their customers informed. "Buttercup", for instance, commented that "It looks like the blame is being placed firmly in Turbine's court for ignoring their European base in order to please the US market. Unsurprising, of course, but disappointed (in Turbine .. ) Nothing Codemasters can do with all the best will in the world if they aren't supported by Turbine...".

A PR disaster? Well, yes and no. On the one hand, memories are notoriously short, and if Book 13 fulfills expectations when it finally reaches these shores, all or or nearly all will be forgiven. And on the other, there is surely something in the sight of thousands of frustrated consumers screaming for their product which must make the hearts of profit-oriented business executives go pit-a-pat.