Yes, let's compare a smaller-budget independant title to the largest, highest selling and most successful RTS game every created by the hands of man that is backed by the second largest video gaming company in human history which plays over the largest online service available today that has been perfected over the last 10 years and funded by three of the four largest franchies in the history of the video gaming industry. Once we've done that, and mocked it for not meeting those standards, let's make incorrect assumptions about it's industry standard connectivity system and insult because it's user don't meet the minimum system requirements for smooth gameplay.

Demigod is not perfect. Far from it. Having said that, some people in this thread need to do a little research before they post and others need to reality-check their expectations.

Others need to stop talking down to others.

Do you think the average consumer gives a rats arse about all that? If it doesn´t work it sucks end of story. Once a company sets a new bar you have to keep up to stay competitive. Do you find excuses for a tv manufacturer that delivers only a black and white tv because color flat panel tvs are hard to do but asks the same price? Probably not you just buy the color tv and laugh at the other company. And to make a comparison to another industry if you ask consumers to pay the price of a ferrari then you better deliver something comparable to a ferrari. And if you make something inferior you better compensate by giving it away cheaper. I never understand why every second rate developer in this industry thinks it can get away putting much less work into a title and asking the same price as those that make triple A content. No wonder a lot of them fail, they have to start thinking realistically.

Not trying to insult anybody but i will never understand why people think this industry should work different than every other. If something has good value, is available and well advertised so that people know about it people buy it if its not they don´t.

It does work. It didn't work at release, however neither did most MMO's at launch - you see, thats one of the benefits of this industry. It is different, and taking advantage of the strengths of it can turn a horrible mess (Demigod at launch) into a great piece of software (Demigod now) at no additional cost to the end user. Another otherwise lost cause would be saved. Trying to hold one industry to the standards of another industry makes very little sense, if you must do so please don't compare appliances to the entertainment industry for god's sake.

Your colour TV analogy also makes no sense for other reasons. Gas Powered Games isn't offering an identical product to it's competitors. They're offering a game, an I.P., a little different to a TV where - to the end user - a TV that works is no different to another TV that works. One game is not interchangeable with another game. Considering that Demigod was launched at a significantly lower price than normal retail games (AU$60 compared to AU$100-AU$120.00) and that 12 months of continual improvements - including two additional Demigods, the aforementioned community features, replays, modding support, etc. - are included in that price, I think it's a fairly good deal. The problem with most users is that they want a completely bug free game with every additional feature they can possibly fathom at release with zero wait time and cite other games that have been on the market for years and that were released in a horrible state as evidence as to what a game should be. Considering the Post-release support we've already received for Demigod, I believe that the promises that have been made will be delievered upon - and not just because of legally binding obligations.
Honestly, it's no wonder so many gamers rant on the internet about how hard done by they are; they have to start thinking realistically.

Side note: Video game players are not referred to as consumers as software can be reproduced indefinatly.

I would much rather my skill determine a battle than my internet connection or closeness to the server.

How many times on cs have i been blasting away on someone, seeing the animation of them being hit many times, yet they only register 1 or 2 hits, not a very competitive way of doing things especially if multiple continents are involved.

p2p ftw on competive games, good hosting will stop the lag.

p.s. lol at the face palm pic !

Hmm so there are plenty of sucessful mmos with 11 milion subscribers out there? Games don´t turn around fixes or not. Please name a few that had crappy sales early on and suddently turned around half a year later and sold milions i don´t know a single one. They have one shot at release to set the gaming world on fire then people move on to newer titles never to look back. Demigod competes with every other action game out there and they are a dime a dozen so competition is fierce. 50$ is a lot of money especially since many gamers are still kids without income so they are very careful when choosing what title to buy and usually go for the best one available that every one of their friends plays and can you really blame them for doing that? That is why COD 4 still sells for 50$ nearly 2 years after release while most other shooters land in the bargain bin after 3 months. They simply do not offer the same quality as the top titles.

this game is not dieing, it is already dead. it probably was dead on release without an usefull mp-infrastructure. they are far to less game open and players online and the numbers are falling. who ever actually thinks this game will have it's breakthrough is just dreaming.

really sad because it's gameplay is one of the best for years. a shame how it was thrwon on the market.

I think this game is very good and enjoyable in the pantheon, it is the custom games that are really pissing me off. In the pantheon though I would rate this game very high and I recommended it to my friends - explicitly telling them to avoid custom games like they would avoid Mexican flue.

i don't know how long you need to wait for a pantheon game but i only onced could join a game since release and it took me 30min of waiting.

the point is not if this game is good or not. indeed it is a very good game. but the mp-infrastructur, the amtchmaking system, chat system out-side of lobby etc. they are missing or are bad. the network performance and so on are all  one of the worst ever seen in a mp-game. the problem is that it si now already too late. customers are not much forgiving. they paid and they couldn't much play this game.

and even now, it is playable but without the needed mp-features. demigod has nearly no players compared to others. and it won't increase. the chance to bind players is over, sadly.

The pantheon lets me join in less that a minute on a typical evening. The matchups are a bit skewed in my favor though since I have won everything, safe for two times where I lost due to crashes to desktop. I lost twice, having two disconnects...

All in all I have no horrible experiences with conncetivity. Sure a player drops now and then, but that happened in Starcraft and warcraft 3 and COD4 as well. This is imo more an internet problem then a demigod problem.

I still recommend demigod to my friends. The community may be small, but that makes competition more fierce which is what I like. If we want to make the community larger we have to start emphasizing (sp?) what we like about it rather than bashing it for problems that are probably getting fixed as we speak.

Games are rarely perfect at release these days at least they are generally playable.  Demigod took broken to a level that is reserved for "special" games.  They missed out on a lot of potential sales because of those mistakes in the early days.  I give them props for the communication and hard work, but the buggy mess of the netcode chased a lot of people away - especially for a game that is basically multiplayer only.

Putting aside the netcode mess, the game has a very kludgy interface for a game billed as a multiplayer focused game.  Pantheon was/is a mess, the stats are borked, the lobby still screws up when you change slots, no "team pantheon," no stats in the lobby, the window overlays for chat and friends, etc., etc.  That also chases people away.  SD/GPG also underestimated that inherent vile nature of people - rage quiters, premade stomps, people trying team Pantheon, etc., etc.  My biggest disappointment is the multiplayer support.  I know games that are over a decade old with better lobbies, chat, friends, matching, and team play.

All that aside, I keep playing the game because it is a masterpiece of play and balance.  That there is more than one DG that people gravitate to is an amazing accomplishment.  So the game succeeds, for me, at the most important level - the game play.  They just need to go back and redesign the lobby, stats, and match play from the ground up - which just isn't going to happen before the community dwindles.

My main issue with the game is the overly high input lag brought on by the "net_lag" feature people were talking about ages ago.

I completely disagree with this. A huge number of people play WoW and COD4 just because that's what their friends play. I have little interest in playing a game I can't play with my friends, since pubbing with randoms introduces far too many problems in every game, and it's fun to try outlandish strategies with your mates. My friends and I all purchased DG, some of us have been playing since beta, but the simple fact was that as a group it was too difficult to get a good game and the strategic depth just isn't there. We now play DoW2, which is unbalanced and imperfect in many ways, but at least we can get in a 3v3 game together without being harassed for being "premade" and get matched against people of approximately the same skill level the majority of the time.

Calling people who get bored of a game and move on fickle is just plain wrong. I played somewhere around 100 hours of Left 4 Dead, I have no desire to play any more since I'm completely sick of it. I went back to TF2 for my FPS fix. This doesn't make me fickle.

Agreed, your description of your actions isn't fickle. You played L4D and stopped playing because you didn't like it any more. This is not what I'm referring to. You'd be fickle if you stopped playing L4F because Killing Floor was released and then complain that Killing Floor isn't Left 4 Dead, which is what I'm mentioning here and is a basic description of the type of players who are thinking Demigod is 'teh deadz' - they've come here from older games and are now bitching that this isn't the game they came from. The features they're complaining are missing have already been confirmed as 'on the way'.

Also, your comments about playing with your friends is different to what I'm detailing. I also have TF2 which I don't play at all unless my friends are online. It's the sole reason I bought the game. I jump in once in a while to play to keep my edge, but that's about it unless we're organising a team game.
This is, again, different from the behaviour of jumping from one game to another because of the order of their release dates or the popularity of the games. The 'Halo Kids' a typically PUGers who don't play in organised teams, and often complain that other games are better. Playing an open match of Call of Duty 4 on Xbox Live, for example, and you'll hear someone complain how Halo 3 is better, or that Call of Duty 4 needs vehicles. Play Call of Duty 5 and there will be people complaining about how CoD4 has better weapons, or is just a better game. They play these games because their popular or more recent, not because they enjoy them. These players will move on to the next game that's released regardless and leave the actual fans of the game in peace.

Wow was successful right from the start thats why they had so many problems they simply underestimated demand. They had to add servers right from the start. So WOW is not a turnaround game. Its an MMO that set the MMO-Space on fire the first day of release. I still remember all the buzz cause i never cared for MMOs untill then but it was hard ignoring it with everyone claiming it was the best thing since sliced bread. From there on it grew to what it is today by offering a finely tuned and polished experience.

Look at all the mmos closing down after a year like Tabula rasa or auto assault. Believe me every MMO developer wants to be in Blizzards shoes and yes i call MMOs that fail after a year failures. Besides Guild Wars, Lineage and Aion what MMO is there to even reach 1/10 th of WOWs population? Quality is king in that space and releasing buggy messes kills you outright at the start. I define success as making enough money to pay for developement costs and keep the company afloat + some profit for investors and looking at the past a lot of companies fail to sell enough to justify keeping a game going or in the worst case have to close the studio. Latest example would be Grin. 2 bad games -> game over.

I wouldn´t throw around terms like elitist when im labeling the average gamer as halo kiddies and hating on entire game communities. Halo is a great game, maybe not your cup of tea but production values are top notch. Im not a halo and COD fan myself but whenever i see someone play those titles i have to acknowledge that they are polished products that deliver a great experience for their customers. And "Halo kiddies" play Halo and COD for years so they are not exactly fickle just cautious where they spend their 50$.

GPG is not a small noname gamedeveloper.

and other idependet developoers have implemented 1000 times more important mp-features in there betas than gpg in demigod. look at the upcoming new dota-clones.

what demigod is missing are MUST HAVES to be able to sell it right! there is no discussion. a mp-title without the right mp-infrastructure and network code is a DEAD END, a wastte of money!

Let's say I did swap from L4D to Killing Floor. I don't own Killing Floor so I'll have to make stuff up.

If KF didn't have a matchmaker similar to L4D, I'd complain about not being able to find a game.

If KF only had half as many weapons as L4D, I'd complain about it not being as varied.

Nothing wrong with that, if it wasn't lacking features I had come to expect there would be no issue.

The people who have jumped ship from DOTA for whatever reason and come here looking for an improvement are quite right to be astonished at the lack of these key MP features, they have driven a lot of people away already I'm sure, and the competitive scene is almost nonexistant. If I bought Demigod today and logged on, I'd probably predict an early death as well.

These features may be "On the way" but it's not going to change the first impressions you get after installing DG and playing a dozen games: the game is fun, it has a bunch of shit DOTA doesn't and some of the new stuff is really cool, it's very pretty, most games are one sided, no voice chat, no in game stats, no banlists, no team automatch, no replays, some stability issues, noticable input lag.

Maybe enough people will stick with the game that in 12 months there will still be regular games going across the various regions, but ultimately those "Halo Kids" are my opponents in most of the games I play online, and I don't think I'd have as much fun without them. If DG can't keep a hold of some of the DOTA migrants I don't have much hope. I still think an expansion pack is the way to go for DG.

Comparions between WoW at launch and DG at launch are nonsensical. Compare it to either Warcraft 2 (Kali)or Starcraft (Battle Net) if you must go the Blizzard route, or perhaps something from a less famed developer but on similar scale such as Homeworld, Myth: The Fallen Lords, or even Supreme Commander. In any case the online experience was poor at launch, I would put it at average now. The problem is the competition from LOL, HoN and other strategy games (DoW2, soon SC2) doesn't look to have average online features, they may have less in terms of balance and graphics but the multiplayer experience seems to be getting top priority from other devs.

@ZehDon

I only wanted to clarify that wow is not a turnaround game, it was successful right from the start up till now. I don´t compare it to demigod. Its just a shining example of good product developement and management.

Did the Dark Knight recoup its costs and made investors some money? If yes its not a failure by my standards. Please reread how i define failure in my earlier posts.

July NPD 10 top PC:

http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/the-sims-3/1014020p1.html

You probably heard this before, NPD is local store sales only.  So Demigod might be selling ok online at impulse.  Lets look at the stats page.  The number of people playing online in July and August stayed in the 2000 average online player.  The online player base has not grown or shrunk.  imho, I think the player base has peaked which Frogboy has mentioned that it will peak in August.

Another thing is that it is not fair to compare to WoW, Sims, Warcraft3.  Lets compare to other great rts games this year like Total War and Dawn of War2.  Those games are out of top 10 as well.  Do you think the community there is screeming doom and gloom?

"Is this game just dying a slow death?"

Depends what you mean by dying.  I don't think it will die this year.  I think the online player base will stay around 2000 average online players all the time this year.   It won't grow or shrink much.  My estimation is that we will get the 2 new demigods in November and a tournament in November.  That should get more players to come back and play.

Actually, the last graph ("players in games") on this site...

http://dgstats.insidesupcom.de

...illustrates the decline.  This is a more telling stat than online players.  Stick a fork in it, it's done.

I know Frogboy declared demigod a success.

One question I have is how many units have been sold total.  The player base has stayed around 2000 for july and august.  Let's assume that it's all brand new players for both months and add 1000 units for a total of 5000 units at $40 each.

That's a net total of $200k.  I wonder what the development costs were?  would even doubling it cover everything?  $400k (10,000 units) wouldn't cover the expenses of 10 people for a year.

I'm just curious though, and am using random numbers.

Like i mentioned before in this thread though, the consistent negative reviews at the games release certainly hurt sales significantly. 

j

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/demigod-expects-100-000-by-next-friday

My guess is that Demigod sold between 160k and 220k copies.  Probably closer to the low end of 160k.

Sins of a solar empire, a game also publish by Stardock, sold 10k copies average a week in 2008.  Sales of Demigod is probably half of SoaSE so my guess is only 5k a week.   It took SoaSE to sell 100k in 3 weeks while it took Demigod 6 weeks to sell 100k.

5 * 12 weeks (since May 29) = 60k

100k sold by May 29th = 100 + 60 = 160k sold in USA total including both online and local stores.