I read the announcement and it sounds to me like ESO is heading into Maintenance Mode

ArchMikem · December 18

I simply don't agree. Changing the development cadence does not mean the game is in Maintenance/End of Life.

DaveMoeDee · December 18

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

Estin · December 18

Integral1900 wrote: »

Craglorn…….. CRAGLORN!!!!!!!!!?????

I love Craglorn, but……..

They rebuilt it because nobody was there! The quest chain was impossible to complete unless everyone was at the exact same stage! There were so few people who finished the quest chain you could’ve fitted them all in one classroom! Why in sanity’s name is this thing being used as the example if your plan is to inspire confidence?

The zone was such a disaster it got a a rebuild, the main quest chopped into pieces, difficulty spikes and pits all over the place, some of the prettiest dungeons and best world building in the game where, after the rebuild, a player could encounter either opponents so feeble they could walk through the entire lot simply holding down the left mouth button, or massive packs of trash mobs with hundreds of thousands of health which beat the snot out of them, basically next door to each other!

The open world needs a higher difficulty set, there is no way around that. The quests need to be beefed up. The base game main quest needs to be beefed up. There is some great storytelling and some wonderful set pieces, but the delivery is a mess.

Quest stages aren't a thing anymore, so I don't imagine that would be a problem unless it's an interior you can no longer access. The game has also been through so much power creep too. I think with both of those in mind, as well as looking back at original craglorn's failures, they can construct something better.

Grizzbeorn · December 19

Cooperharley wrote: »

I expect to hear actual specifics in Q1 about what we’ll see and when

As stated multiple times in the letter, we aren't getting any more details until April, which is Q2.

Arunei · December 22

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

LadyGP wrote: »

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

LadyGP wrote: »

Servadei wrote: »

It's not full on maintenance mode, but I'd call it soft maintenance mode and frankly I don't think that's a bad thing. ESO is massive. It's about time they went deeper into existing zones instead of releasing shallow new zones like Gold Road.

So yes, agree... it's a "soft maintenance mode" and I think the community should embrace it. I also love the idea that they are going to try new things and let the devs "experiment".

That's what they say, but we were expecting a new Chapter announcement in a couple of weeks... now nothing until April, when they might announce some kind of "season". Hardly breeds any sense of confidence.

As for "experiments", I'd rather they experiment at their own dollar, not mine. I want to be paying for a game that works. Experiments, bug fixes, oversights, performance updates... that's all part of the game I have already paid for handsomely, I shouldn't have to pay for them again.

How can they experiment if they don't push it to live? It's not like the entire game is going to change. They already said they will add a new campaign for the experiment related to cyro. I don't see anything wrong with this.

If you want to think about it a bit differently any "change" they make to ESO has been an experiment. If it's received poorly or didn't work as intended they change course. Now they are just going to be more aggressive and transparent about said experiments.

They can, and do, experiment with the PTS.

Unfortunately they don't listen to responses (see Jabs...).

Since so few people really use the PTS (largely because ZOS rarely seems to listen to feedback, so a lot of people just don't bother these days), it probably isn't the best way to test features. They won't get the same engagement in the PTS or get a proper stress test for things there since there's a much smaller portion of the player base that uses it compared to the main game.

fizl101 · December 22

Arunei wrote: »

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

LadyGP wrote: »

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

LadyGP wrote: »

Servadei wrote: »

It's not full on maintenance mode, but I'd call it soft maintenance mode and frankly I don't think that's a bad thing. ESO is massive. It's about time they went deeper into existing zones instead of releasing shallow new zones like Gold Road.

So yes, agree... it's a "soft maintenance mode" and I think the community should embrace it. I also love the idea that they are going to try new things and let the devs "experiment".

That's what they say, but we were expecting a new Chapter announcement in a couple of weeks... now nothing until April, when they might announce some kind of "season". Hardly breeds any sense of confidence.

As for "experiments", I'd rather they experiment at their own dollar, not mine. I want to be paying for a game that works. Experiments, bug fixes, oversights, performance updates... that's all part of the game I have already paid for handsomely, I shouldn't have to pay for them again.

How can they experiment if they don't push it to live? It's not like the entire game is going to change. They already said they will add a new campaign for the experiment related to cyro. I don't see anything wrong with this.

If you want to think about it a bit differently any "change" they make to ESO has been an experiment. If it's received poorly or didn't work as intended they change course. Now they are just going to be more aggressive and transparent about said experiments.

They can, and do, experiment with the PTS.

Unfortunately they don't listen to responses (see Jabs...).

Since so few people really use the PTS (largely because ZOS rarely seems to listen to feedback, so a lot of people just don't bother these days), it probably isn't the best way to test features. They won't get the same engagement in the PTS or get a proper stress test for things there since there's a much smaller portion of the player base that uses it compared to the main game.

Also only pc players can use pts, console cant

Arunei · December 22

Ah yes, there's also that. Hard for console folks to test anything in the PTS unless they also have the game on PC.

SeaGtGruff · December 22

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

The letter did not say that there will be no more new zones. My understanding is that new zones will still be added, but they will not necessarily be huge in scale or released according to a strict (and confining) timetable, although large zones can still be added a chunk at a time, or adding a zone and then releasing story questlines and miscellaneous quests within that zone over multiple updates rather than trying to release it all at once.

SaffronCitrusflower · December 23

OtarTheMad wrote: »

It’s not even close to maintenance mode. We don’t even know what Seasons are going to be like so we don’t know what kind of content we will get, maybe more, maybe same or maybe less. I just don’t see maintenance mode.

PvE may not be in maintenance mode, well see how 2025 plays out, but PvP hasn't seen any updates since when exactly? Circa 2019 or so I think. (minor QoL improvements like stacking siege, which should have existed since day 1, don't count and neither do adding a few outposts and destructible bridges and gates. I'm talking about performance improvements and pop cap increases needed to keep Cyrodiil thriving, not just scraping by)

TaSheen · December 23

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

The letter did not say that there will be no more new zones. My understanding is that new zones will still be added, but they will not necessarily be huge in scale or released according to a strict (and confining) timetable, although large zones can still be added a chunk at a time, or adding a zone and then releasing story questlines and miscellaneous quests within that zone over multiple updates rather than trying to release it all at once.

Uh.... I didn't get any of that from the very short letter, personally. Sounded like "pulling the plug" to me.

spartaxoxo · December 23

TaSheen wrote: »

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

The letter did not say that there will be no more new zones. My understanding is that new zones will still be added, but they will not necessarily be huge in scale or released according to a strict (and confining) timetable, although large zones can still be added a chunk at a time, or adding a zone and then releasing story questlines and miscellaneous quests within that zone over multiple updates rather than trying to release it all at once.

Uh.... I didn't get any of that from the very short letter, personally. Sounded like "pulling the plug" to me.

2025 End of Year Letter wrote:

.....As 2025 will be a transition year for new content, we are going to have new zone-based content launch in 2025 - but you'll have to wait until April to hear the specifics about how it is different.....With the changes to our content release model, please be assured that we are not abandoning new quest content – but we will do it in different ways than we previously have. As our focus will not be on adding giant new landmasses – although we will do that from time to time. Some of these are:

Continuing the stories in existing zones and storylines and bringing back familiar characters

New stories focused on hallmark Elder Scrolls organizations like Dark Brotherhood, Thieves Guild, Fighters Guild, and Mages Guild

Splitting a large zone across multiple updates

It is definitely the case that they still plan to have new zones alongside zone based content in existing areas.

Blacknight841 · December 23

Every chapter since morrowind has launched with less and less content. So much so that this year they even split the companions from the chapter so that you either had to pay for them or that you had to have eso plus. Without the companions in Q4, the update would have only contained a revamp of battlegrounds that haven’t seen a new map in 5 years.

Arunei · December 23

TaSheen wrote: »

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

The letter did not say that there will be no more new zones. My understanding is that new zones will still be added, but they will not necessarily be huge in scale or released according to a strict (and confining) timetable, although large zones can still be added a chunk at a time, or adding a zone and then releasing story questlines and miscellaneous quests within that zone over multiple updates rather than trying to release it all at once.

Uh.... I didn't get any of that from the very short letter, personally. Sounded like "pulling the plug" to me.

Ah...except the letter kind of explicitly says they're still going to do new zones and stuff but will be doing a lot of new content within currently-existing zones, so...

Arunei · December 23

Blacknight841 wrote: »

Every chapter since morrowind has launched with less and less content. So much so that this year they even split the companions from the chapter so that you either had to pay for them or that you had to have eso plus. Without the companions in Q4, the update would have only contained a revamp of battlegrounds that haven’t seen a new map in 5 years.

It's very possible the reason we've been seeing less content is because the devs were just working too much on a crunch schedule to pump out the big Chapter and everything a big update entails. Maybe they were hoping dialing back some on content would give the devs some breathing room but it didn't quite work out, so now they're trying this new, more flexible release schedule with smaller but more frequent content batches? I dunno, just a thought.

LikiLoki · December 23

Perhaps the maintenance mode is what is required for this game world right now. After the foundation of the game is repaired, it will be possible to build new floors.

barney2525 · December 23

I dunno

I think they are starting to figure out making things harder and harder every rollout was not a great idea.

How many players go fight Dragons on a regular basis? Harrowstorms ? Now we have the new big deal in West Weald. How many players are running those now that the initial GR event has passed?

At least with the Original WBs, once you have leveled and geared, if there is no one else around, you can still complete them. Lots of achievements that go unfulfilled these days - especially if you are trying to sell new players on playing the game.

I don't think it's Maintenance mode. I think it's more Reflection mode. How do they improve the game they already have in place, while appealing to the largest number of players.

I have started a couple new characters, and IMHO the new entry into the game is Outstanding. Everyone starts Soul-less, associated with the Main Story, every if you don't play through the tutorial.

IMHO

LunaFlora · December 23

TaSheen wrote: »

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

The letter did not say that there will be no more new zones. My understanding is that new zones will still be added, but they will not necessarily be huge in scale or released according to a strict (and confining) timetable, although large zones can still be added a chunk at a time, or adding a zone and then releasing story questlines and miscellaneous quests within that zone over multiple updates rather than trying to release it all at once.

Uh.... I didn't get any of that from the very short letter, personally. Sounded like "pulling the plug" to me.

that kinda sounds like you didnt read the entire letter

TaSheen · December 23

LunaFlora wrote: »

TaSheen wrote: »

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Sounds to me like they identified customers to target to continue to be profitable long term. They are reducing the cost of development considerably by not doing new zones and keeping things small. Making old zones look better will make them more enjoyable for new players as the base games zones are great. Might also be nice if you already met a base game NPC in other content, they have new dialogue that acknowledges that.

Seasons sound horrible. But I am some who doesn't like all the events and despises dailies. Seasons have never appealed to me in any game.

My concern with these quests being added in old zones is that the base game zones were really well designed to progress through main, guild, and faction quests in order. Even the dungeons were coordinated. Adding new quests need to fit in to where you left the main story to minimize continuity issues. I am very skeptical of the quality of "bite sized" quests to come. But maybe they decided it is just better to focus on the MMO crowd going forward or committed grinders.

The letter did not say that there will be no more new zones. My understanding is that new zones will still be added, but they will not necessarily be huge in scale or released according to a strict (and confining) timetable, although large zones can still be added a chunk at a time, or adding a zone and then releasing story questlines and miscellaneous quests within that zone over multiple updates rather than trying to release it all at once.

Uh.... I didn't get any of that from the very short letter, personally. Sounded like "pulling the plug" to me.

that kinda sounds like you didnt read the entire letter

I've actually read it about ten time now, and I still get the same throwaway vibes I've had from every letter this time of year for the last at least 6 years.

Time will tell of course.

Danikat · December 23

Maintenance mode means the game doesn't get any updates except the bare minimum to keep what already exists online. No new things of any kind, not even small things, no quality-of-life updates, no new skins or sets or items, it doesn't get shut down but doesn't get updated at all either.

So no, the announcement doesn't sound like maintenance mode, because they are still planning to add new things. It might not be as much as before, or anything you or I really want, but it's not maintenance mode either.

Arunei · December 23

The thing is, we don't even know if it will be less content than we're getting now. It could amount to roughly the same amount or even more than we get with the current release cycle, just split up across the year. We don't really have enough info to jump to the conclusion that overall we'll be getting less stuff than we do now.

tomofhyrule · December 23

Arunei wrote: »

The thing is, we don't even know if it will be less content than we're getting now. It could amount to roughly the same amount or even more than we get with the current release cycle, just split up across the year. We don't really have enough info to jump to the conclusion that overall we'll be getting less stuff than we do now.

Neither do we have enough information to jump to the conclusion that it will be the same amount or more either.

That's the problem. We don't have information. And people are frustrated that we don't have information. And this year, instead of getting an idea of a vague roadmap in January, we get to wait until April to find out even what the new format's going to be, much less what kinds of things we'll be getting.

moderatelyfatman · December 24

I'd like to clarify my original post and apologise in advance for a very ranty letter. If you take the Director's Statement literally, then the logical response would be excitement at the new changes to a yearly chapter format that was getting stale. Add to that the upcoming fixes to Cyrodiil and performance and 2025 would be shaping up as the best year ever. It would not be a reasonable conclusion to think that the game was heading into Maintenance mode based on those words alone.

Sadly, when what people say and what they do are only vaguely related things, you are forced to try to read between the lines and make an educated guess based on past performance and their motivations. In a different post I've pointed out the years where improvements in performance have been promised (every year since 2019+) so I don't need to go there.

So what is left? The only thing I can trust about ZOS is their honest desire for our money. If Chapters were selling like hot cakes then there would be a chapter in 2025 not matter how stale the concept had become. The only thing I trust ZOS to delivered on time in 2025 will be the Seasons since this is the only thing mentioned in the statement that can be obviously monetised.

Now addressing why I stated I thought that ESO is heading into Maintenance Mode: I think if the Seasons fail, there is nowhere else for ESO to go. New Chapter sales weren't making the numbers, nor selling the new dungeons separately and neither is ESO+ now that the game offers little to no new content in Q3/4. The decreasing playerbase (especially longterm players who are likely to spend big) meant that the Crown Store has probably peaked some time ago, no matter how hard they push it.

The cancelled events shows how badly defoliated the money tree is right now. As with all businesses, if they can't increase their income they have to cut costs and I think there is a good chance post 2025 that PvE will follow the same track that PvP has been in over the last 6 years.

@LunaFlora , @TaSheen , @Cooperharley @spartaxoxo

Mavloc · December 24

They are making hand over fist in profit between ESO+ and Crown sales.
So where is all their money going? That's what their announcement should be about.
I don't care about their plans, show me the balance sheet.

moderatelyfatman · December 24

Mavloc wrote: »

They are making hand over fist in profit between ESO+ and Crown sales.
So where is all their money going? That's what their announcement should be about.
I don't care about their plans, show me the balance sheet.

Remember that in our current corporate mindset, a business that makes the same amount of profit every year is in need of new management and one that makes less profit than the previous year is failing.

Personally, I think that ZOS is getting squeezed pretty hard from above which is why I don't think they will be delivering on things which can't be monetised (e.g. performance, class balanced etc) any time soon.

If you want to know about finances, there is an entire Reddit thread for that.

Berret · December 24

Reading the letter it didn't sound like maintence mode at all?
Maintence mode would be Swtors huge update several years where the big thing was a new animation when you opened the lootboxes. Thankfully they got new leadership.
Honestly the way they have been releasing chapters just isn't sustainable. Crunch to release a chapter with new mechanic and/or class then abandon it while they need go work on the following years chapter.

I'm fine with more bite sized content, there's already A LOT to do in the game.

Arunei · December 24

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

The thing is, we don't even know if it will be less content than we're getting now. It could amount to roughly the same amount or even more than we get with the current release cycle, just split up across the year. We don't really have enough info to jump to the conclusion that overall we'll be getting less stuff than we do now.

Neither do we have enough information to jump to the conclusion that it will be the same amount or more either.

That's the problem. We don't have information. And people are frustrated that we don't have information. And this year, instead of getting an idea of a vague roadmap in January, we get to wait until April to find out even what the new format's going to be, much less what kinds of things we'll be getting.

I do agree that making people wait until April is...a very not-smart thing to do. But it takes more emotional energy (imo anyway) to constantly doubt than to withhold judgement for when information IS given. My main point was aimed at those who are claiming with absolute conviction that the new release cadence 100% HAS TO MEAN that we're getting less content, but we just don't know if that's true. We can speculate it might be, but no one should be going around saying it is like they have some insider proof the rest of us aren't privy to.

OtarTheMad · December 24

Arunei wrote: »

Blacknight841 wrote: »

Every chapter since morrowind has launched with less and less content. So much so that this year they even split the companions from the chapter so that you either had to pay for them or that you had to have eso plus. Without the companions in Q4, the update would have only contained a revamp of battlegrounds that haven’t seen a new map in 5 years.

It's very possible the reason we've been seeing less content is because the devs were just working too much on a crunch schedule to pump out the big Chapter and everything a big update entails. Maybe they were hoping dialing back some on content would give the devs some breathing room but it didn't quite work out, so now they're trying this new, more flexible release schedule with smaller but more frequent content batches? I dunno, just a thought.

Definitely agree that it was probably because of the schedule plus less memory every year to work with because of old consoles limitations