Darkfall: Devs to Limit Initial Access

MMORPG.com had a chance recently to grab an interview with the cagey Tasos Flambouras, lead developer for Darkfall Online. The interview covers a lot of familiar ground but there are a few nuggets of information that should pique the interest of readers. Read on to find out more about the limited access on release day.

MMORPG.com: Can you give us any more details on pre-order plans?

Tasos: We will have a pre-order so that we can service Darkfall's customer's better pending release. The pre-order customers will be able to download the game prior to the 25th and to enter the game on the launch date.

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There will be a limited number of pre-order copies of Darkfall offered, and a limited number of copies available at launch. We won't try to support more users than we can guarantee a good gameplay experience for, and if demand is higher than supply, then we will move to a structured release. It's also not a matter of simply throwing up a few more servers to meet increased demand. Darkfall being a sandbox, real-time, seamless world able to support over 10 thousand concurrent users requires considerably more infrastructure and support in place than your average MMOG. We will do what is necessary to support the demand, but it's not going to be instantaneous.
The overwhelming majority of the people who have played the game have expressed their interest in pre-ordering, but it's not our intention to urge anyone to pre-order, rather to inform that this is an available option.

So, intrepid readers, what do you think of this unusual release strategy? Genius or folly? Let us know!

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In other words: "We need more time and YOUR money to accommodate more of you, and until that happens... YOU CAN'T COME TO MY PARTY!"

weezer:
In other words: "We need more time and YOUR money to accommodate more of you, and until that happens... YOU CAN'T COME TO MY PARTY!"

Well...yeah, that's it in a nutshell. :P

I don't see a problem with it, as long as they don't spend forever getting the new players into the game it should be fine.

No no, they just want to see us fight like dogs for scraps of meat.

Oh yes this will totally be the game capable of knocking WoW off it's throne, what with it barely being able to support 10,000 players and all. I think they should refer to it now as an sommog (sort-of massive multiplayer online game).

One would certainly think they could make an OPEN BETA for about a week to work out overcrowded server kinks. That way they could launch into full release. BUT NOOOOOOO....

rofl i'd like to see that pc which does all of the development, customer support and allows 10.000 people to play on it :D

I'm thinking that they want our money and lots of it before they'll let people play the game to it's fullest. I'm getting this very uncomfortable feeling that I've done this before, ya, with AoC.

Well why not.

It's better than putting up servers to accomadate the large number of people who just go from launch to launch when the vast majority will leave the first time they get Pked and go back to WoW.

Just a waste of money on extra server capacity that will ultimately get shut off.

uhm... ya that's complete rational thinking. "Screw people that will want to play, because they might leave soon anyway." That is either very pathetically pessimistic or incredibly honest if they admit their game is so bad it will only entertain gankers. The bad part of that is soon there would be no one left to gank.