The Hype Surrounding the Release Date of MechScape
Written by Simba


Hey there! My name is Simba. I'm pleased to have you here on MechScape World reading my article on the topic of how much Jagex should tell us about the release date of MechScape.

It is a dilemma that every games company faces time and time again. "What do we release to the public to build as much excitement as possible, being careful however not to raise expectations too much?" This has to be one of the most difficult issues leading up to the release of a new game, with things such as the release date being kept a closely guarded secret in some instances.

Jagex told us that MechScape would be released in the first quarter of 2009. This article is being written at the end of the above period - and as yet, as I am sure you are all aware, we do not have MechScape. No matter how big a company is, and no matter how many successful releases they've had in the past, things can go badly and delays are inevitable.

Jagex perhaps have not been too wise on this front. By announcing the release date as the first quarter of 2009, they have let down a lot of people who were really excited about the game coming in March. Now they have postponed the release until an unannounced date. This idea has problems in itself, since now people really do not know when to expect it. It could be released next week, or it could be released in three months. Due to the lack of knowledge, people will not be able to get excited about the release as much as they might be able to otherwise. It might seem silly, but several gamers I know take great pleasure in crossing off days on the calendar left until a big release! However, now Jagex have avoided the problem of letting people down once again, as they did by announcing the release for the first quarter of 2009.

It is a delicate balance; Jagex really should announce the release date of the game when they are certain they can provide a top quality game for this time. If they release MechScape completely out of the blue, the general RuneScape populous will be very confused - although Jagex have treated MechScape World very much as a partner site so far, most RuneScape players have not heard of MechScape. By releasing MechScape entirely randomly as it were, Jagex would not be taking full advantage of the excitement they could build up prior to release. By announcing the release date, say, a week or two beforehand, maybe even when everything is fully complete, Jagex would be able to revel in the hype that would ensue - and this excitement would definitely help MechScape off its feet in the first few days, rather than a lot of people being completely confused.

I am sure that Jagex will realise the above and we will see more and more clues dropped closer to the release. I know many people are getting very excited already, even though MechScape may not be ready for another few months. One other tactical decision Jagex face from a business perspective is whether to release MechScape at the start of the summer school vacation. Though MechScape is targeted at an older audience, many teenagers will certainly want to play, and Jagex could tap this market by cunningly releasing the game when this demographic section is most vulnerable.

To conclude, although it would be fantastic to see a release tomorrow, it seems somewhat unlikely. Jagex have more than enough sense to realise that excitement about a new release is an extremely positive thing, so I am sure we will be hearing the release date announced a short time ahead. On the other hand, Jagex will be prudent I'm sure; we won't be hearing another "MechScape will be ready in precisely three months time." Timing is the key. The massive contrast between excitement and disappointment. I have faith in Jagex to produce a wonderful game for us and take the above into consideration to make sure the release of MechScape (and the last few days prior to it) go in the best way possible. For now, Jagex have told us to sit tight and ignore any speculative dates we may hear; their emphasis is on releasing the game when it is as good as it can be, not before.

Thank you very much for reading.

MechScape and Community News

Promotions:
We've had a few promotions this week, make sure to post your congratulations. (read more)

Donors:
This week we added the much anticipated donor feature. A member can now donate money to the site and receive bonuses such as a forum section for donors only and a usergroup. All money donations go towards the site. (read more)

The Pliigi Attack:
This week as an April Fools joke we had the Pliigi, a playable race in MechScape, attack the forums. They evolved from eggs into full grown monsters over only two days. Their attack was so powerful they even took control of MSW for awhile. (read more)

Massively's Jagex interview at GDC09:
In an interview with Massively at the Game Developers Conference Jagex revealed many things about MechScape. One sentence reads: "The game centers around the tension among four distinct species, each with their own look, abilities and back stories. Throughout the game, players can choose their alliances, which shape the path of their adventure. There are hints of cloning, player-built vehicles and even spaceship building eventually." (read more)

Jagex statement regarding the name of MechScape:
Jagex provided us with a statement to help explain why they recently referred to MechScape as merely their game's "code name". It seems that while until recently they've been intending to call it MechScape, now they aren't so sure. They also made it clear that "there is still a fair amount of development work left for us to do" on the game before it is ready to be released. (read more)

Meaning of 'Mortiga'
It was revealed that Mortiga, a potential race in MechScape, is Esperanto for "deadly". (read more)

Previous Editorials:
MechScape Post #4: Gerhard’s Influence on MechScape and Jagex
MechScape Post #3: A Great MechScape Flood?
MechScape Post #2: The MechScape Environment and Concepts
MechScape Post #1: MechScape Clan Leadership

Footnotes
Contributors: Ren (Content Research Team); mike470, Simba, Xela, zepherusbane (Writing & Editing Team).
Disclaimer: The views expressed by members of staff do not necessarily represent the view of MechScape World.

Good read. I agree that the game will probably come out in the summer when most teenagers will have more time on their hands because of not having school. I also agree Jagex shouldn't have released the release date "Q1 2009" until they were certain that was it. Many people including myself got excited, only to be shut down when the game didn't come out.

Summer or really close from there is my guess too, probably June.

Fun to read! Good job!

~ Stan

I agree. I can remember a lot of people I talked to on Runescape being extremely hyped about MechScape and it's release. I can safely that I was one of those players too. It was disappointing to go through all of the month of March without even a single tidbit, other than an interview scored by PoultryChamp which only confirmed already known suspicions we have had for a long time. Other than that and a digital poster, nothing. I wish Jagex could've been more wiser in hyping the game, like as it's mentioned in the article. I know Jagex doesn't want to over hype it, because sci-fi MMO's have a tendency to "not really do well", but there would've been absolutely no hurt in hyping MechScape just a TEENY bit. Albeit; opening up the mechscape website with at least SOME screenshots to tie us over.

Ah yes, it would be fantastic to see a release for tomorrow, but it's just something we really can't look forward to anymore, because MechScapes release could be any-day. It could be on Monday, or it could be in June. Who knows? All I know is, is that I hope Jagex knows what they are doing in terms of hyping it (which in this case, is rarely any). I just hope it's released at all. It's better to have it be released then cancelled, right?

Good work in writing it Simba! I agree to many of points in the article.

Nice writing! I enjoyed reading your article, really interesting!

I guessed june 22 in the "Guess when mechscape is realesed" post but i hope it's
more around june 1st
Good read by the way i agree

Hmmm...Interesting....

Good work Simba i like every post of this

Sure it let down people, but delays happen in almost every company.
*Brings out nerd glasses*
Take Boeing for instance, their 787 was supposed to take off on it's first flight at the end of '07. Then it was 08, and now I have heard from a Boeing Employee that it's sceduled for June. Some of those delays were the fault of the company, some weren't. Sure I was dissapointed (being the plane freak I am) but what are you to do? Would you want them to finish it completely or send it out to fly with 1 wing and no tailfin? Boeing said "end of '07" because that was when they expected to fly it. But because of delays, here we are with no 787 yet.

The same goes for Jagex. They said "Q1 2009" Because that was when they expected to release the game. But because of delays, just like the 787, they're not ready to send it out to the public. Now they say "when awesome" because if they put another release date out, and are hit with another delay in the development, Jagex will have to go buy some earmuffs to deal with the extensive whining they will endure.

good read - really summed up everything,
but it doesn't make the game get released any faster :P

Good writing, and I agree.

To be honest, Jagex shouldn't have said Q1. It just made us all excited

Nice work!

I doubt Jagex would have said Q1 if they weren't sure at the time that the release date was going to be somewhere around then. I'm just curious as to what added so much extra time.

Good read thanks, will be interesting to see if they do bring it out at the start of the summer holidays.

When they Say delays, its not Delays in the sense of bugs and errors, its by their most recent admittance over their ambitions and constantly adding new content to the game that holds everything up.

Thanks for this post, very interesting.

I'm pretty sure that Mechscape won't be released this month
because on 1 April I made a thread on forum with the title ~Mechscape is out!!!Mod Katia posted in th thread and sayed

"Mechscape is out???

As usual, the Forums are always a good way to keep us informed!!!

When I saw the title I thought… How is this possible??? Then I realized it's 1st of April.. silly me!!"

çr¢wde

the BETA may come out "soon" and beta's usually take a while, im really not expecting mechscape to come out until August or September

a question i have concerning the beta: if we play in the beta, will we get to keep the xp we earn during the beta, or will we have to start anew when they end the beta

Very nice post, Simba. Good job to all the contributors too

Nice thread!!

As for the release for MS.......I think that releasing MS durring Summer vacation for the schools might be a bad move. My reasoning is if they release it durring "peak" user activity it could be tough on the servers and any unknown bugs. Jagex has problems with QA/Testing and with a whole game comming out it could be a stress test that causes them to have to close down the servers for repairs. That would make for some bad press to launch the game and have it crash due to unknown bugs and such.

I think it would be smarter to launch at a time when there will be less users so the servers don't get overwhelmed and any bugs (And there will be bugs) can be fixed with less damage done. People will find bugs/glitches and try to exploit them, we have seen it many times.

The Q1 2009 release date always seemed a rough estimate to me and I'm not surprised to see it moved back. I'll be interested to see how the build up to MechScape's release goes. Many developers hype their MMOs as much as possible, but Jagex have always operated differently to the other big companies out there. I expect if MechScape was being developed by any other company, they'd have already released some teasers and started building the hype.

How far in advance will we know when MechScape is coming out? Jagex were very quiet on the FunOrb front, which granted isn't quite on the same level of MechScape, but is a sign that the release could be an unexpected one. Jagex does appear to have changed quite a lot in the previous year, though; certainly since Mod MMG's entrance there have been a lot of changes I thought I'd never see. Could this site even be given some of the first solid information about the game exclusively?

Regardless of whether Jagex purposely hype the game or not, I'll be getting very excited about its release. I hope it lives up to my expectations.



As it's a beta, I expect you'll have to start anew. Unfair amounts of XP, items, or anything else in the game could be earned during the beta period, which won't want transferring to the official release.

Hi Guys,

I've been reading here for quite a while, now its time for my first post ;).

When you are a Company like Jagex, then there are also other finacial issues, you have to concern about. Behind every development stands a costing budget and someone must invest money to the project (e. g. Programmers has to be paid). These investors also have expectations to the release date of the project, because the they dont want that there money is binded for too long in this project(especially regarding economy crisis). Another point is, before you start a project, you have to make calculations, how long it will take to finish the project and how much it will cost to complete and release it. Most of the time this business plan is very strict and don't have space for exceptions. So every day or month the game isn't release yet only produces costs and no income.
I heard of other games, which where close to release but they get out of money and so they couldn't go or released it very buggy. I don't think Jagex will make such mistakes but they always have to keep its finacial status in mind. (Sometimes waiting for too long and selfmade perfectionism can ruin your Company)

Best regards

Then lets shall wait again...

Hawt

Im hoping for a beta release soon and a summer release for the game

Good Read! Well done Simba!

I think you raise an interesting point about it being released in the summer holidays when the teenage market is so "vulnerable." As everyone has probably now realised, MechScape will not be released in the first quarter of 2009. This now makes it increasingly likely for a summer release, I think it would be very foolish of Jagex to release MechScape during the May-June period as this is the main exam period for a huge amount of students and would consume any free time their target demographic would have otherwise. For MechScape, if that is still its name, to have a good release, it only makes sense for Jagex to release it at the beginning of, or during, the summer holidays, unless it is released in the next week or so.

As always, I enjoyed this MechScape Post. Even though I read it earlier, being a writing staff member, it still holds up. Good work, Simba.

Great job Simba.

I think they would be better off showing us their current progress in the project, rather than either force themselves to fulfill a release date or disappoint players by not giving them any insight as to when they can play it.

Remember some time ago when JaGEx tried to do the older Development Diaries? The ones where they would add those progress bars that would tell us how far their project is going, namely seen in the Impetuous Impulses Development Diary. If they added that bar somewhere, we'd get a better-estimated idea of how far along they are, but without risking a rushed product because the bar shows actual work progress, instead of time progress... like a "loading" bar, if you will. They did it before and it worked fine, so idk why they haven't tried it for MechScape's release lolz

Very well written, I agree on most of it but I also think game companys are a little to touchy when it comes to releasing a bug free product, there has never been a bug free product and if any one is thinking it will be well they are fooling them selfs.

+1

The one part of this editorial I am inclined to disbelieve is the stated intent of releasing the new MMO in time for summer vacation.

Jagex has maintained that this game is infact for an older demographic. A summer release would contravene that as most adults work longer hours during the summer months.

If Jagex is true to their word, then they should avoid a summer release!

I realize that as the article was written, there was infact a disclaimer prior to that thought. However, I don't think that it would be applicable. For the most part, I'd say that the 17-23 crowd would be busy with summer jobs and their social schedules. I know for me at least, during those years, video games took a backseat to partying with friends. Couple that with responsibilties, and you have a formula for an imminently botched summer release.

I really don't think there will be much in Mechscape to hold youngsters interests. I could be very wrong, but all indications I get is that this game will appeal more to adults and a minority of teens (intellectuals)

Jagex is going to need as many users as possible so if they can attract kids Summer would be the ideal time to launch. They are a business and getting a return on their investment is what they are looking for. Runescape started out not very kid friendly and now look at it. I wouldn't be a bit suprised to see it launch right before summer vacation.

Although I'm starting to doubt the game is even that close to launch. I was thinking that Beta would have launched by now.

That was an enjoyable read.

I can imagine they have an internal release date, they just don't want to give it away.

Blegh, now I'm upset that I missed the April Fool's event and didn't get that cool looking badge.

Excellent thoughts!

wait a sec.....

I THINK i read somewhere that Jagex was planning on a 3rd MMO in 2010 which may include micro payments?? = stellar dawn??


who knows......

50 domains is not an exxageration. The amount of "mechscapemillions.com"and others are astounding.

http://www.mechscapeworld.com/forums/index...?showtopic=6292