Darkfall Schadenfreude Alert

Posted on February 26, 2009 by Scott Jennings| 76 Comments

As the Darkfall servers are now up and accepting customers, I’m announcing that the Darkfall Schadenfreude Level has been lowered from OMGZRed to Working As Expected Orange. Stay tuned for future updates; watch especially for the Darkfall developers to come out of their bunkers to announce how much they pwned the rest of the industry.

And yes, as Tobold and others have noted, I am taking an unhealthy level of glee in this. Come on, it’s been almost a DECADE of interacting with the wonderful and perfectly well-adjusted Darkfall community. This makes Horizons look like a marvel of efficient project management.

But now, it’s shipped. And as Tasos and the other Aventurine developers are about to discover, things change when you go live. The wolves have teeth, and they’re going to be looking for soft necks.

To commemerate Darkfall being up and available for your pwning roleplayer needs, the best Darkfall video ever made.

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  • Raad

    No sheep? =(

  • Raad

    Oh and forgot to mention, your titles are getting messed up whenever they are long and use big fonts.

  • Vaxhacker

    Is a company still AT STEAK here? Just checking.

  • Trevel

    Hrm.

    So there’s the interesting design challenge: Make a game where playing as a sheep is fun — where people will voluntarily sign up to be ganked.

  • Njal

    I thought it was Gitchless that was AT STEAK. Sadf and whatnot.

  • http://weblog.probablynot.com Jason

    Trevel :
    So there’s the interesting design challenge: Make a game where playing as a sheep is fun — where people will voluntarily sign up to be ganked.

    Just put in a bunch of achievements, title and talents that can only be unlocked as you progress up the “victim” tree. You have to lose to win!

  • http://www.thejadedgamer.net Fatsquatch

    Trevel :
    Hrm.
    So there’s the interesting design challenge: Make a game where…people will voluntarily sign up to be ganked.

    I play a Warlock on a World of Warcraft PvP server, so it’s possible.

  • http://tobolds.blogspot.com/ Tobold

    Wouldn’t you want Darkfall up and running perfectly, and then failing on game design issues? Otherwise in a year when you point out how Darkfall failed you’ll get all those revisionists telling you that it wasn’t because of hardcore PvP, and if only the servers had run better the game would have been a great success.

  • Vaxhacker

    Njal :
    I thought it was Gitchless that was AT STEAK. Sadf and whatnot.

    Ah, you are correct. But still, for some reason I was reminded of that…

  • http://dsob.wordpress.com geldonyetich

    We don’t get too many MMORPGs like Darkfall Online anymore. You know, complete trainwrecks whose mockery is ripe for humor. ;)

    But, that said, I wish them the best. It’s a bit late for “the best” to manifest, but hey, game design is hard and I have to congratulate the courage of anyone who tries sees through their dream game even knowing that it’s far from perfect. Well done, Derek Smart Darkfall Online team.

    In my mind, Darkfall Online was never trying to cop mainstream appeal. They weren’t going for Final Fantasy or Diablo, they were going for Gothic. That a bunch of fans piled in and expected otherwise was a misconception on their part.

  • http://www.brokentoys.org/ Scott Jennings

    Tobold :

    Wouldn’t you want Darkfall up and running perfectly, and then failing on game design issues? Otherwise in a year when you point out how Darkfall failed you’ll get all those revisionists telling you that it wasn’t because of hardcore PvP, and if only the servers had run better the game would have been a great success.

    If Darkfall was up and runnning perfectly, it wouldn’t *fail* on game design issues, it would stabilize as a niche game (which it may still do if it manages to get past launching).

  • Raad

    @Tobold
    It will be in a day or two and ‘sides, why shouldn’t you bash it? The developers/supporters/fans have been as arrogant about it as ever, making sure that they mention how horrible and stagnant the MMO industry is day in and day out and how everyone is a carebear.

  • dartwick

    That link is funny. But I think its a troll.

    But the guy gets points for confusing George Wallace with Alfred Wallace.

  • TariqOne

    I admit I’m enjoying it as well.

    Yeah, yeah. They’re MMO people — gamers, even. Yeah, yeah. They’re a small company trying to row against the foul current of a rotting industry.

    Except they’re not. They’re trying to pull off a worldwide release of a massively multiplayer game that they’ve claimed will accomplish any number of wondrous things. They’re charging over 50 bucks for the thing.

    Ultimately, Aventurine currently presides over one of the most noxious MMO communities I’ve had the pleasure of seeing. It has shown abject incompetence in basic areas even a good team of modders can get right (website, communication, distribution via means other than torrents).

    And it’s taken years and tens of millions of dollars to get to this day. It’s really hard to root very hard for them in the end.

  • Raelyf

    People keep keening that you need sheep to have wolves, and thus Darkfall will inevitably fail. That’s a pretty flawed notion, however.

    Consider: A group of 5 goes out ganks 10 people, who they’ve caught alone or small groups. Later, the 10 who were killed group up and go kill the entire group of 5. Each of the guys from the original group of 5 feels pretty good about it: sure, he died but he made 10 kills in the process – not a bad ration. Each of the guys from the group of 10 feels good about it too – sure he died, but he made 5 kills and got his revenge.
    Sure, it’s a 0 sum game – there was 15 kills and 15 deaths total. But thats not how the indivudual players will walk away FEELING, and thats all thats important.

    That being said, that sort of system relies on a level of balance, and the game itself has to be actually, you know, playable. Darkfall may just suck, but I don’t think it’s impossibly to make all players feel like wolves – regardless of the truth of the situation.

    Darkfall won’t be mainstream in any case – but it’s not meant to be. I think niche games are what makes gaming special, myself. Sure, most of them, Darkfall included, will more than likely never pique my interest – but games like EVE Online and Europa Universalis I’ve sunk countless hours into; they feel almost as if they’re designed just for me. I’ll be the first to say: WoW is a great game and deserves its success. However, if WoW shut down I could jump ship and play LOTRO or EQ2 or half the other MMOs on the market – and while it might not be the same it’s not so different. There’s no substitute for games like EVE or EU2 or Dwarf Fortress, however – they’re one of a kind, flawed or not.

  • Hatch

    Scott Jennings :

    Tobold :
    Wouldn’t you want Darkfall up and running perfectly, and then failing on game design issues? Otherwise in a year when you point out how Darkfall failed you’ll get all those revisionists telling you that it wasn’t because of hardcore PvP, and if only the servers had run better the game would have been a great success.

    If Darkfall was up and runnning perfectly, it wouldn’t *fail* on game design issues, it would stabilize as a niche game (which it may still do if it manages to get past launching).

    Uhg, the PVP crowd is the seedy underbelly of MMO gaming. I would know, I am one of them and I kind of disgust myself with the lengths I go to for winning. I would stab my own sister in the uterus with a dull spoon if I knew it would guarantee me a clear advantage in PVP. The more hardcore your audience is the harder they are to please, the faster the whole thing collapses on you.

  • Vivianne Draper

    Broken Toys: All Darkfall, All The Time.

    geesh lum quit advertising these people’s games for them.

  • blachawk

    Raelyf :
    People keep keening that you need sheep to have wolves, and thus Darkfall will inevitably fail. That’s a pretty flawed notion, however.
    Consider: A group of 5 goes out ganks 10 people, who they’ve caught alone or small groups. Later, the 10 who were killed group up and go kill the entire group of 5. Each of the guys from the original group of 5 feels pretty good about it: sure, he died but he made 10 kills in the process – not a bad ration. Each of the guys from the group of 10 feels good about it too – sure he died, but he made 5 kills and got his revenge.
    Sure, it’s a 0 sum game – there was 15 kills and 15 deaths total. But thats not how the indivudual players will walk away FEELING, and thats all thats important.

    What in the hell are you trying to say? As long as the number of kills = the number of deaths, then everything is fine? How could the number of kills not equal the number of deaths?

    Your example is more flawed than the ‘notion’ it was trying to disprove. The 10 ‘sheep’ rarely ever are able to band together and hunt down the 5 that killed them. In a world with teleportation and wide open spaces, it’s a relatively rare event for a skilled ganker to actually get cornered.

    Go think about what you’re trying to say some more.

  • http://bdadv.blogspot.com Bonedead

    @Vivianne Draper
    I don’t think they need any more players tbh. I still can’t even buy the game because there are so many fuckers beating me to it.

    As much as I want to argue on the internet with all the people hating on a game they don’t even care about because they’re holding a friggin 10 year grudge with some 12 year olds, I must resist.

    *lolpvper takes the high road*
    /win

  • http://simple-n-complex.blogspot.com Openedge1

    I am disappointed. The video advertised 30 minutes of running, and all I see is a 6 minute video. I better get my other 24, or I call the whole Darkfall game a sham, a hoax..

    (BTW: I heard they have to nerf arrows real fast…)

  • dartwick

    Vivianne Draper :
    Broken Toys: All Darkfall, All The Time.
    geesh lum quit advertising these people’s games for them.

    This is an MMO site. This is the only semi-major MMO release in Months. It has MMO players everywhere talking. Its being released this week.

    Wouldnt he be remiss if he didnt talk about it?

  • http://crymore.de EpicSquirt

    Let’s talk after playing.

  • http://hudshideout.com/blog Hudson

    My New Years prediction still stands. This game flops and is a distant memory in 4-5 months. Have fun.

  • TariqOne

    dartwick :

    Vivianne Draper :Broken Toys: All Darkfall, All The Time.geesh lum quit advertising these people’s games for them.

    This is an MMO site. This is the only semi-major MMO release in Months. It has MMO players everywhere talking. Its being released this week.
    Wouldnt he be remiss if he didnt talk about it?

    Agreed. In fact, it’s a wonder it isn’t being ridiculed more widely, given all the grist for the mill. It’s getting a free pass because barely anyone cares anymore.

  • Raelyf

    blachawk :

    Raelyf :
    People keep keening that you need sheep to have wolves, and thus Darkfall will inevitably fail. That’s a pretty flawed notion, however.
    Consider: A group of 5 goes out ganks 10 people, who they’ve caught alone or small groups. Later, the 10 who were killed group up and go kill the entire group of 5. Each of the guys from the original group of 5 feels pretty good about it: sure, he died but he made 10 kills in the process – not a bad ration. Each of the guys from the group of 10 feels good about it too – sure he died, but he made 5 kills and got his revenge.
    Sure, it’s a 0 sum game – there was 15 kills and 15 deaths total. But thats not how the indivudual players will walk away FEELING, and thats all thats important.

    What in the hell are you trying to say? As long as the number of kills = the number of deaths, then everything is fine? How could the number of kills not equal the number of deaths?
    Your example is more flawed than the ‘notion’ it was trying to disprove. The 10 ’sheep’ rarely ever are able to band together and hunt down the 5 that killed them. In a world with teleportation and wide open spaces, it’s a relatively rare event for a skilled ganker to actually get cornered.
    Go think about what you’re trying to say some more.

    Wow so much hostility – the point is that even though # of kills always equals # of deaths, people don’t FEEL like it does. Each member in above scenario will walk away feeling like they died once and made 5-10kills – so everyone feels like they’ve done exceptionally well. I’m not saying that ‘sheep’ as you call it, will have a fun time playing – I’m saying that wolves don’t need sheep to enjoy the game. Darkfall isn’t nor never claimed to be a game for everyone, and the guys who got ganked will gank others in their turn. You call the 10 people in my example ‘sheep’, but thats not the case – theyre just wolves who’ve wandered off alone.

  • elijah

    this game will make conan look like a rampant juggernaught success lawl

  • dartwick

    Im still expecting rampant hax.

    But I guessing most of the peeople saying PVP most the time doesnt work also think EVE shouldnt work(yes I know you can PVE in EVE but thats just evidense that no matter how week your content is someone will use it.)

  • taodon

    So, seriously – was the person that made that video A) slightly devoid of a sense of reality B) mostly devoid of a sense of reality or C) Completely and totally devoid of a sense of reality? Seriously…

    “I’m making this video because I want people to know that I invented the tactic of turn-n-shoot first”

    “I’m making this video because I want people to know that I was in beta – because you can’t become a legend unless you can prove you were in beta and that’s important”

    I mean, let’s not bother making a difference in the real world, but as long as you have a beta video in Darkfall, then you’ll be a legend? And we’re surprised that we are behind on multiple metrics internationally?

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  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Tim-Daniels/1366287053 Tim Daniels

    That video was so hilariously bad that I couldn’t tell if it was real or just an act. The guy was so self-delusional. It’s hard to take seriously.

  • blachawk

    @Raelyf

    So by logical extension, massive zerg battles should bring pure joy to everyone because even though you died, you feel like you killed hundreds. Interesting idea, but not true.

  • TariqOne

    Tim Daniels :That video was so hilariously bad that I couldn’t tell if it was real or just an act. The guy was so self-delusional. It’s hard to take seriously.

    That’s Dread OG, the self-professed “Best PKer on Darktide.”

    Considering his body of work I vote reasonably sophisticated joking veneer over acutal debilitating epeen issues.

  • http://crymore.de EpicSquirt

    He is taking the piss, his wording, both spoken and written are too well to be so dumb.

  • Raelyf

    @blachawk

    That sort of extension fails. Its hard to say where, but at some point between the lag and feeling completely irrelevant to the battle’s outcome, most people don’t enjoy massive battles. People don’t feel like they killed hundreds of people during massive zerg battles because they didn’t – they’re lucky to have contributed at all to 1 or 2, let alone meaningfully. Ganks and small group battles are why people will play Darkfall – assuming they play at all, of course.

  • blachawk

    Tim Daniels :
    That video was so hilariously bad that I couldn’t tell if it was real or just an act. The guy was so self-delusional. It’s hard to take seriously.

    One side of me says that has to be a fake in the same sense as the Leeroy Jenkins video. Another side says it’s probably one of the wtfmen.

  • http://www.battlevortex.com William Purvis

    My IQ dropped dramatically…

  • Adam

    “That’s Dread OG, the self-professed “Best PKer on Darktide.”

    I suppose this could be true, given the current population on Darktide. He wasn’t particularly well-regarded when I last played (pre-WoW), and was a bit of an immature douche as well. But then again, who on Darktide wasn’t?

  • Pat

    The 30 mins of running in that video reminded me of a criticism some EQ fanboy made about WoW back during the beta. (He would jump into discussions about non-EQ MMOs and complain that he hated them due to some idiotic reason.)

    He was complaining about how it was impossible to raid Undercity because his low-level raid kept losing members due to bordeom and getting killed by monsters as they RAN ON FOOT FROM IRONFORGE TO UNDERCITY.

    Apparently, this was a glaring design flaw and not just a case of unreasonable expectations.

  • Pat

    Oh yeah, and why on earth is that archer pulling his bow like that? His right hand has to be twisted around when he draws the string.

  • gyrus

    Raelyf :
    …
    Consider: A group of 5 goes out ganks 10 people, who they’ve caught alone or small groups. Later, the 10 who were killed group up and go kill the entire group of 5. Each of the guys from the original group of 5 feels pretty good about it: sure, he died but he made 10 kills in the process – not a bad ration. Each of the guys from the group of 10 feels good about it too – sure he died, but he made 5 kills and got his revenge.
    Sure, it’s a 0 sum game – there was 15 kills and 15 deaths total. But thats not how the indivudual players will walk away FEELING, and thats all thats important.
    That being said, that sort of system relies on a level of balance, and the game itself has to be actually, you know, playable. Darkfall may just suck, but I don’t think it’s impossibly to make all players feel like wolves – regardless of the truth of the situation.
    …

    But this is where the “wannabe Hardcore PvPers” are exposed as frauds.
    The group of 5 goes out and kills the 10… of which at least 1 (probably more) will log out and ragequit. And for every 10 people that log out this way, 1 will go to the forums and whine that the whole game is overrun with ‘ganksquads’.
    Maybe some of the 10 will group together and hunt down the group of 5 – and a couple of them (the original 5) will ragequit too… since it’s only fun when it happens to someone else.
    And over time, a PvP grouping size will be established that will become the ‘norm’ for the game. It will become common knowledge that in order to PvP you need a group of X players. Player groups with less than the magical ‘X’ wont even try.
    You will also see another unusual behavior… if two groups of X meet – they will NOT fight – they will skirt around each other.

    Now sure, after a long period of time, the wannabe PvPers who don’t like to die ‘eva’ will all drop their subs and the game will be left with real PvPers who can handle a ‘k/d ratio’ (Kill/Death Ratio) of 1 – but even within that there will be some players who are far better than others. Great for them – bad if you are one of the others (IIRC there is an article here or on Raph Koster’s site about this).

    The subscribers that are left are hopefully enough to keep the Developer in business? At THAT point we may see the games potential.
    We are a few months away from that yet.

  • Einherjer

    Why all the hate?
    Why are people so affraid that Darkfall will have it’s place?
    I think that everybody likes to be a wolve or a badass…
    Now, most will know that they are not badass enough to even try the game… And you can’t have that. :D
    Me? I suck at PvP and I don’t think i’m even going to try Darkfall but i wish them all the luck in the world.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Tim-Daniels/1366287053 Tim Daniels

    TariqOne :

    Tim Daniels :That video was so hilariously bad that I couldn’t tell if it was real or just an act. The guy was so self-delusional. It’s hard to take seriously.

    That’s Dread OG, the self-professed “Best PKer on Darktide.”
    Considering his body of work I vote reasonably sophisticated joking veneer over acutal debilitating epeen issues.

    If he wasn’t raising his voice at the end of each sentence even if he wasn’t asking a question, I might believe it.

  • merlyn

    blachawk :
    In a world with teleportation and wide open spaces, it’s a relatively rare event for a skilled ganker to actually get cornered.

    Considering the yahoo was even saying he hasn’t died yet because he logs out when he’s in trouble, I wouldn’t be surprised to see that become the basic tactic of the ganker…at least until they patch that out…

  • http://www,damnedvulpine.com/ J.

    Tim Daniels :
    That video was so hilariously bad that I couldn’t tell if it was real or just an act. The guy was so self-delusional. It’s hard to take seriously.

    Should check out his Youtube account, he’s been doing them for at least a year and a half now. Previously about Asheron’s Call-Darktide.

    We’re sure his parents keep him in the basement so the neighbors don’t have to see him.

  • http://www.thisisnotacommunity.org D-0ne

    That guy in the video has got to be doing comedy… I laughed my ass off on the whole “I’m just like Darwin” comparison thing.

    Hilarious stuff.

  • marlowe

    Wait, someone who worked on Dark Age of Transportation is running a video that mocks another game for endless running…running…running…?

  • Nirgal

    I think you guys got trolled pretty hard.

  • sinij

    Lum, your obsession with a Darkfall fail is unhealthy. I know you *love* to see anything PvP fail, but DF’s impending doom has nothing to do with PvP and everything to do with bad design decisions.

  • Vetarnias

    When I hear of players wanting hardcore consequences, for some reason I always think of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA1HVaupDyw

  • Vetarnias

    taodon :
    “I’m making this video because I want people to know that I was in beta – because you can’t become a legend unless you can prove you were in beta and that’s important”

    Or, as I like to call them, the beta fish. Which could also describe their in-game behaviour.

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