Era - Facebook
 

I realize this and many other large situations are all-inclusive in the recent topic of Conversation : Graal (Free To Play).

However, I'm curious, specifically, whats the thought of an Era-Facebook?
It looks good on paper, but many things do before being dissected properly.

So, on that note:
What's the thought of an Era-Facebook in comparison to the PC Era?


From first-glance, it seems as though it'd detract away from PC Era,
if its even partially as successful as Era iPhone or Classic iPhone. The playerbase would easily trump that of the PC Era and with more people to kill there, it seems many people would shift to that version, instead. (Just my first-glance thought)

Whats everyone to think though?

Furthermore, will the Era-Staff be pursuing a structure in which the Free-To-Play Concept can be actualized?

Answers, =o.

We haven't been told anything. It is likely that Era on Facebook will be Era iPhone with some additions to make it easier to play on a computer—this is shown in the screenshots as well. I would guess that Era PC will be scrapped soon after the Facebook release (but again, unixmad has ignored my questions, so I don't know). They won't want two versions of Era.

I did read somewhere that he would introduce standards in-which pc servers may convert to the Free-To-Play concept and be advertised as such, or am I mistaken?

He said that, but the problem is that I can't imagine them having two competing servers with the same graphics, the same concept, and the same name on Facebook. I think it will come down to them killing either iEra or PC Era.

You don't seem to have much of a competitive spirit.
If that's the case, why don't the developmental bodies combine and formulate a Hybrid Era? An inclusion of the classic Era traditions and the new Era advancements.

We still don't really know how well the Flash client performs yet so it's hard to say if the current playerworlds will be able to run at an acceptable rate.

Being able to provide PR support for the entire platform is another headache that interests me.

If you also go to a flash game site, we should also think onto account of hacking and exploits... There's a whole new bag of problems there.

I've been mining information about the Facebook transition for awhile so let me share some of it.


The rational for going with iClassic and iEra is because they are:

• proven to rake in cash;
• already being touched a lot by Stefan, so he is familiar with them; and,
• free of any coordination troubles with existing managers/staff.

It basically all comes down to getting fbGraal done quickly and pushing it out. The other playerworlds can 'come later' so to speak.

I know this is really terrible thing to do to PC Era and PC Classic, but it should be expected by now. Unfortunately.




I've heard through the grapevine that it performs very well. The implementation is using a C->Flash converter called Alchemy, made by Adobe. Alchemy works something a little like Java, but converts from C to run on the AVM2 rather than from Java to run on the JVM.

Ah, that makes perfect sense, then.
Staff don't seem to be so thrilled about it.
But then again, sounds like one of those "oh well" situations.

That's because we've been given a vague idea on the news.
We don't know the entire system or what it truly entails.

I don't know what is going to happen with PC Era. I do think iEra is going to be the FB version though

I dunno, but I get the feeling that the Android/iOS/Facebook versions will be released as "Standalone games" created by Eurocentre and the PC version is essentially going to be rendered as a total development platform (Hence the dev tool updates all of a sudden that were announced) and Gold/Classic/Hosted will cease to exist (or be completely useless) and everything will be "Design your own world, play with your own stuff, invite friends to play your personal "space" etc etc instead, doing away with a server list entirely and just have news from the "Standalone games" being updated to the login screen. Money made from the PC version would just be extra bread on the side since the other versions are raking in the real dough.

Personal feeling of course, but the way things are being set up, if it were my idea I'm sure it would have crossed my mind to look at it that way. Certainly makes for a global gelat shop possible rather than multiple gelat shops on servers and can still do away with the account subscription since it's no longer necessary, charging people only for creating servers.

I also think this is a possible idea for them. Not to mention they could then take the servers they think have potential and them make them into facebook servers and what not. So basically, we get to do all the work, and they can just copy/paste that work and start raking in the money.

guys did u see facebook aps? lmao facebook era will never be able to compete with real era, it will just have more players like iphone era but if some ppl to correct advertising jobs much more ppl will come to real era

You couldn't be more wrong. Are you aware facebook has over 500 million active users? Theres no way PC Era will ever be able to compete with iEra/Facebook Era. Ever. :)

They could always combine Facebook era with PC Era

Well you can't just combine the servers. The Facebook app has to be compatible with iEra. So all weapons must work on both an iPod and in a web browser. I'm not really sure what the plan is for the server. It would be nice to just let the PC version stay and let players choose Facebook or to use the GraalOnline application.

im not talking about the playercount...im talking about the quality of the game, facebook era would be another iphone era
im tryna say that u cant achieve era's quality with a facebook app
what should be done is send ppl to advertise real era on facebook/iphone telling them to try to download graalonline software, and as soon as they realise it's much better and the voice spreads era will have a rly high playercount

:confused:

Or you could just log into Era PC through facebook....

and they could scratch the idea of iPhone players logging into Graal Facebook...

PC Era's economy is complex atm which is one of the main reasons why i like this game, many many guns and weapons, but I mean if Era Facebook comes in play with all 90+ guns/melee/and random weapons then i might integrate over there, but id stay at PC Era because of its vast collection of weapons that i am still tryina make money to afford, which may never happen. nevertheless, just make era PC free then host the server on facebook and we can have alot of players on a already established game. But have a wider variety of "Gelat purchasable" items, which can also correlate with the Facebook Coins. Just my two cents.

era is already free!

Their objective is to make money. Therefore, I think since iPhone Era is already structured in that manner, they are deciding to take that avenue. Also, PC Era is a turnoff for new players.

very true

We have a half-developed tutorial for Era which would greatly improve the experience for new players—but there's no way I'm finishing it until I hear from Stefan or unixmad on their plans.

No response to my attempts to contact them regarding the potential conflict of interests aswell.

Classic's normal plans are also on hold but we are working on something that while fun could have a major -selling- point, Era ofcourse being up and running and already having a gelat shop means that it would be being pushed to the side more thoroughly, but who knows maybe they could change their plans if presented with something financially mouth watering, I don't think they understand the language of promise.

I don't think it matters if the PC and iPhone versions of a server aren't the same.
They still introduce players to the core idea of the server (swords and guilds/guns and gangs) but then the PC servers can go much further than the iPhone servers can in terms of features and content because they're not as limited by hardware.

I think that if you replaced PC Classic and Era with iPhone Classic and Era it'd be a step backwards in terms of content and quality, but those servers still have very desirable playerbases. I'd much rather Unixmad and Stefan make a real effort to try and convert those players to the PC version instead of just allowing PC players onto those servers.

Ofcourse it doesn't really make any difference from a Developers perspective or it's players perspective whether the iPhone version is similar to the PC version, the name is something of importance to what is a relatively smaller group of people many of which in Classic's case have moved on from Graal, but in the event of the server being drastically different to the original (which I'm not really sure if it's the case with Era) that does beg the question of why even use the name?

The damage to the servers image may be insignificant, but it's still more significant than the advantage if iPhone players are coming onto the PC, and in similar fashion to players of the original server, becoming disappointed that it isn't the same as what they are used to, especially if it's mainly the sheer playercount rather than the content that attracted them to the iPhone server in the first place.

Definitely, I wish they would too, but like you say it would require a real effort, the sad reality is that this could only possibly be achieved by the efforts of PC Graal's developers/players.

i just realised that they cant delete pc era since they sold LIFETIME classic subscriptions to many users
all of them would have to be refunded plus it would be possible to sew Stefan

That's irrelevant, and if they did they would probably get away with it.

If they keep the native client and flash client separate, nothing will probably happen and the differences will be disregarded.

*Sue

Im not one to stick needles and make a blanket out of someone who goes against the contract.

Then you must not be very dedicated to your cause.

exactly lol
i'm 99% sure he can't close down since he sold us lifetime membership
it's as if you pay 1 year of gym membership and after a month the gym closes down and ur just screwed over..doesnt work like that

You are joking, right?

A 1 year gym membership is not the same thing as a lifetime game membership. Lifetime refers to the life of the game, not your personal lifetime. You could try to sue if they shut down the game but you'ld lose.

But if you hunt down administration and make quilts out of their flesh, you might have a chance at being reimbursed.

If they've kept it up this long then they must be making at least some profit off of Graal, and I'm sure the new exposure will only increase that...

So I don't see why they would suddenly shut it down.

What motivation is there to develop on a development platform then when you make something great it moves to Facebook, then your version gets scrapped?

x?x

it's like your server is going to heaven, you say goodbye to it because it's for the better.