...that icky, icky feeling.

Just wanted to add a couple more places you should look for reactions to this whole thing.

First is over to Cuppy, who is, ummm, pissed and doesn't hold back her opinion of what's going on....part of the reason why I like reading her site.

Second is over at Broken Toys who makes the same point as I did regarding the upcoming MMO market and Vanguard's tough fight to stand out in it.

As I'm reading the coverage, a lot of folks are not taking that posting by Brad very well...no, not well at all. This is part of the reason why Brent suggested that he not talk anymore...this point will be well proven at the end of all this I'm sure. Some people are looking at this passage specifically:

The only fix here, again, is time. Vista (especially the Ultimate edition, which is what's being pushed to gamers) wants fast components. Direct X 10 hardware and software will help a lot, especially when there is a DX10 version of Vanguard. A native 64bit client of Vanguard will eventually help a lot too. Bottom line: by the end of 2007, a lot more people should have upgraded, especially if Microsoft succeeds with Vista and native DX 10 games. And if they really push Gaming for Windows like they did, say, the Xbox 360, the end of 2007 and beginning of 2008 should be a very different landscape for PC games in general and Vanguard specifically. Was the Vanguard tech ahead of its time? Yes, and there has been a price to pay for that short term (although many people are able to play with older machines - why? Different configurations, different settings, different thresholds for lower framerates, etc.). But MMOGs ideally never end and if you've architected your engine to both push the limits of existing and near future technology as well as easily employ future technologies, then you have a game that doesn't look dated one, two, even three plus years down the road. And that's what we did with Vanguard - so we feel some pain now, but if we can keep the momentum going, this decision pays off in the long run (big time).

The last I checked, Vista was not doing so hot in terms of gaming. In fact, if you were to look at Vista/DX10 as a platform launch (like the XBox360, or PS3), for gaming it was the worse launch in recent memory. How many games launched with the launch of Vista? None. Zero. To date, and correct me if I'm wrong, people are still encountering video card driver issues. Dell recently announced that XP will continue to be an option for their customers since Vista is such a clusterf^%$. So Vista is not ready for gaming and Brad is betting on Vista for Vanguard....ummmmm. From what I'm seeing/hearing/reading, no game is betting on Vista for it's success and that platform has zero buzz in the market right now as the OS of choice for gaming.

This is not good...not good at all. Say if Vista is ready for gaming prime time by 2007-2008, MMO gaming does not work in a vacuum. By that time, like I said, Warhammer will be hitting the scene, LoTRO will be entrenched (plus expansions) and WoW and/or EQ2 will be ratcheting up the marketing RPMs for their next expansions.

D out.