Curse

drago34 · Aug 01, 2007, 04:22 PM // 16:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Miral

I'm actually on the fence about buying WoW or not

I beta tested it and I just couldn't get into it enough to make the monthly fee seem worth it :/. Just my own experience with it.

jkyarr · Aug 01, 2007, 04:32 PM // 16:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

I'll once again say that the breaking point for a opinion, not a full review! is lv. 20 and/or you have done the Deadmines instance. The Deadmines instance alone was one of the key impressants back in 2004.

Sorry my opinion stands. Call it an "initial impression only opinion" if you want, since it deals soley with the noobie experience to level 8, 7 different times. Bottom line remains that I tried my best to dig into it and find something that satisfied and kept me coming back. I even tried different player roles just to see if one played in a more appealing way to me than the others. Moral of my story is that the experience of playing through the first X character levels of the game should not be classified as something that has to be endured if there's to be any expectation that I continue to play.

Bryant Again · Aug 01, 2007, 04:33 PM // 16:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

I probably should have mentioned that I played 7 different characters to level 8, deleting and remaking different races, professions etc. SO 7 X 8 = 56 character levels... Given this isn't the same as a single 56 level character, but now long do you have to taste crap before you spit it out?... oh wait... that might be candy... no I think it's crap.... or is it cinnamon? ... no definately crap >----spit----<.

That still shows nothing. You are judging a whole game based on playing very very very little content. It's like me making 10, or even 30 characters in Guild Wars, leveling them only to 4, and basing my view of the game on that.

In WoW, you haven't even gotten out of Pre-Searing.

Quote:

As for these low level instantiated dungeons in WoW... that's truly news to me. I dare say they were retro-fitted, not in the original game, right? Were they added with patches or added with Burning Crusade?

No, they've always been there.

Ouchie · Aug 01, 2007, 04:57 PM // 16:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

Me likey the swimming in LotRO! What is it about swimming in video games that's so cathardic? Did you notice they listed it as one of the things definately included in GW2? How funny is that? Hurray for swimming!

/exhalesmoke

I like the swimming too and of course the jumping and horses I'd love to see those three in GW. GW2 sounds like it is heading in that direction

jkyarr · Aug 01, 2007, 05:03 PM // 17:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

That still shows nothing. You are judging a whole game based on playing very very very little content. It's like me making 10, or even 30 characters in Guild Wars, leveling them only to 4, and basing my view of the game on that.

In WoW, you haven't even gotten out of Pre-Searing.

No, they've always been there.

Ok I'm cool with admitting that I can't do a comprehensive review of the game, but the idea that my opinion is ill formed because the game held no content that compelled me to continue is as phony as can be. The fact that I deleted and repeated many characters was incidental to the boredom, not a planned test approach.

I was a noob who saw no compelling reason to continue. The game utterly failed to engage me... dangle a carrot, etc. Allegedly 5 million other folks "felt differently" about it than I did, or were the just sucked into the black hole vortex of no other significant and new MMORPG titles at the time of release?

When it's torture to rise above noobiedom that means no noobs can voice their experience and have an opinion?

So these "low level" instantiated dungeons that you're saying were always there... what level of spawn do they have? What character level were they actually designed for? Just curious. Would have much preferred to check them out.

Amorfati87 · Aug 01, 2007, 05:15 PM // 17:15

I've played both WoW and GW.

I really like WoW for the Auction House, Professions, Non-Instanced Areas, Riding on Gryphons to Travel, In-Game Email System, Mounts. Edited post to add, Jumping and Swimming.

I really like GW for Sexy Female Characters, Weapons, Heroes/Henchies, Missions, Fighting.

If GW would adapt some of the features of Wow like the Auction House, In-Game Email System, Mounts, and Professions that would be awesome.

Bryant Again · Aug 01, 2007, 05:20 PM // 17:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

When it's torture to rise above noobiedom that means no noobs can voice their experience and have an opinion?

No it's fine, just as long as your clear about what your opinion is concerned with. It's not fair to say that WoW is a horrible game when you haven't even left the starting area.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

So these "low level" instantiated dungeons that you're saying were always there... what level of spawn do they have? What character level were they actually designed for? Just curious. Would have much preferred to check them out.

There are instances designed for every level after 15. You could actually probably start at 12.

Despozblehero · Aug 01, 2007, 05:38 PM // 17:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

I'm 30 years old with a full time job and a 5 person family to support. I tried WoW 2 different times at the behest of 2 different life-long friends. A 14 day trial each time.

Having 2, 14 day, spances of trial time into a game may give you a little bit of insight, but hardly makes you effectively capable of judging it wouldnt you agree?

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

The season of my life where I can get involved in a computer game of the caliber of WoW, or SWG (back in the old days) or LoTRO, are gone. While these games offer very enjoyable and very involved content, the accessibility of the truly entertaining content is such that it is beyond me, and I believe my demographic, to dedicate the level of commitment inherently required in these types of games.

Again nothing wrong with having a family life, but should your demographic be looking at an rpg directed solely at them, I mean traditionally rpgs need to have to that level of commitment its part of the fullfillment of the game. You work hard your character gets stronger, you can do more stuff, you cant get stronger etc. Nothing wrong with making it possible to play casually but if it makes the game suffer as a whole (and in an rpg it does) its probably not a good idea.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

There were other factors that entered in to my decision to never play WoW. Paying a subscription fee is subversively asking for a higher level of commitment to the game itself, if on nothing more than a subconscious level, because of the innate human requirement to get your money's worth out of the things that you pay for. The effect is to increase the amount of time people are dedicating to the game, and the result is that people are more highly invested in the outcome. That sets all players up for an inexorable day of reckoning where something in the game changes and they just snap and decide they've had enough.

Trust me its not limited to a monthly subscription fee based game. I used to really love what GW could have been, but one mistake followed by a stupid cover-up after another led me to your "had enough" conclusion. Now in a subscriptin based game thats going to hurt the game makers and they will have to do something to fix it or else lose their source of income, however in the free based play they can afford to ignore you. Theyll just say "its a casual game, put it down for now and come back when your excited about new content" ;p. I mean they blew a lotta smoke to get you to buy the 1st one they can blow even more smoke tell you buy the "fix" for the problem and you might be tempted to go for it cause its "free play," and there are some good things you like about it...

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

Putting these type of requirements on their players and then not even giving them aesthetically pleasing graphics added insult to injury. If you want me to spend hours in your game, give me something to look at already! If I wanted cartoons I'd turn on cartoon network!

Well if your opinion is the graphics arent as good thats fine, but to me theyre ok in both games... way better than my early days of Atari and Nintendo... but the game itself should be the main focus if it looks good thats a bonus. By your reasoning I should have Blue-Ray or whatever the new HD DVD stuff is to replace my old DVD collection cause it "looks better." To me the difference is negligible.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

And then there was the camping. My 2 WoW trials happened months apart, approximately 3 and 8 months after WoW originally hit the market. each and every time I got on to play, whenever I took a mission/quest/whatever I spent around 20% of my time in town prepping, selling, etc. 20% of my time travelling to the objective locale, and 60% of the time camping the pet-kitties that were the spawn that the 8300 noobs and I were there to kill. NOTHING ABOUT THIS EXPERIENCE SUGGESTS GOOD DESIGN OR GAMEPLAY.

Two 14 day trial hardly makes you an expert. Theres soooooo many things to do in WoW and soooooo many servers that I doubt that 100% all your neccesary quests were taken up. Again I think its your lack of experience more than actual valid judgement.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

Admittedly I never got any of the characters I tried beyond level 8, but I'm an experienced enough gamer to know when I like something and when it doesn't hold my interest

Again you played zero time in the game and if you only got to lvl 8 you experienced 1% of the game content im sure.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

My point is that GW is renovating the genre in ways WoW hasn't begun to fathom. Non-subscription based MMO, Awesome graphics AND content in the same game, instantiated zones to minimize spawn camping, map travel to eliminate superfluous travel time. All these things contribute to an optimized gaming experience. And no I don't want to hear about the high level dungeons that are instantiated in WoW, nor hear mention of the griffons that save so much time travelling across Azuroth or whatever the freak the continent is called. Good concept, weak implementation.

If by genre you mean RPG well FF beat GW, if by MMORPG well GW PvE content is really in all honesty lacking. Its doubtful to convice you of this I'm sure so I wont even try, but in terms of character development, storyline, quests, ways in which to interract with people and the surrounding world, all are lacking in GW imho from an MMORPG standpoint... and if in that "travel time" I run across people hey I may end up playing with them or killing monsters on the way to gain some loot/exp great!, its not like its mindless walking like you make it out to be with your oh so wise lvl 8 world walking experience... As for Instances.... You know of the WoW instances obviously, again lvl 8 (although theres plenty of low lvl instances in WoW

. If walking is your only problem well dont play an RPG you pretty much gotta do that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

Leveling is about earning access to content, loot, encounters, and prestige based on how well you know your profession's strengths and weaknesses, and how skillful you are at playing them. In a world where guildmates help their noob friend shoot up the character level number and farmers can reach the "top" by repeating the same kill 9700 times, that little number next to your name means NOTHING about how well you play.GW hints at this by shifting gears after level 20 to skill acquisition and encounter variation. It's all about having a good skill repetiore and being able to switch up for varying circumstances that may come up during encounters. The Character Level number is tertiary... nearly insignificant.

Well in WoW if a lvl 70 kills something and has a like lvl 5 in the party the lvl will get none to little exp, GW has power levelers though lol. GW may have once been skill orientented but not anymore... the encounter variation is neglegible and really only affects monks. Most monster mobs are taken out the same way dont aggro to much lure them to you and hit 1234 1234 1234: repeat. Takes no skill trust me, one of my biggest gripes with GW PvE is its skilless. Even the higher-end stuff, which imho is worse cause its like 6 hours of running around skillessly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

So why all the pussies begging for validation that they don't get from their parents in the form on an interminably escalating character level number? Go play tetris already! I don't want misrepresentative numbers jackin up the gameplay in my game!

I dont even care about the level cap honestly, Ive never advocated for it to be raised or given it much thought. I think it has to do with the amount of available/replayable content of an RPG im sure. The lower the level cap is, the less varying amount of content you can have, because less of a middle ground... atm in GW if youre NOT 20 you insta-suck and stay on noob isle/ascalon for proph (which is small/secluded) theres nothing to do for a mid-range level character so rush rush rush to get that 20 cause nothing else matters unless your max lvl in this game. Getting your skills is a side benefit but you need those att points and HP if you really want to get anywhere. If you dont want misrepresentative numbers jacking up the gameplay in your game, shouldnt listen to anything anet says, ot that idiotic buisness model which is equivalent to making a cross-country 8 lane freeway for a guy on a bike... 3.5 million copies sold world wide, 1 big empty friend/guild list... Actions>Words

jkyarr · Aug 01, 2007, 05:48 PM // 17:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

No it's fine, just as long as your clear about what your opinion is concerned with. It's not fair to say that WoW is a horrible game when you haven't even left the starting area..

So the fact the game held no appeal to continue beyond noobieness is not construable as even an ounce of it's overall crappiness? The content beyond what I played may be the best gaming ever written... how would I know? If I can't stand to slog through the initiation of "suffer the noobieness" zones then the rest of the content doesn't enter in to the discussion. That's the biggest darn shame of all. I obviously missed out on what many other people felt was the good part of the game because I decided not to pay my dues in newbie-land.

Was my experience typical? Perhaps not. Totally insignificant? Probably not. So if you're blizzard and you hear about my kind of experience happening do you say, "there may be something to this." Or do you take my 18 years of PC gaming expirence and chuck it, saying some self-consoling quip about how "this guy was a pussy. couldn't even hack the noob zones." and leave it at that? We like what we do so we're going to leave it like it is.... Ask Sony Online Entertainment how well that mantra has worked for them.

Miral · Aug 01, 2007, 06:00 PM // 18:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

I dont even care about the level cap honestly, Ive never advocated for it to be raised or given it much thought. I think it has to do with the amount of available/replayable content of an RPG im sure. The lower the level cap is, the less varying amount of content you can have, because less of a middle ground... atm in GW if youre NOT 20 you insta-suck and stay on noob isle/ascalon for proph (which is small/secluded) theres nothing to do for a mid-range level character so rush rush rush to get that 20 cause nothing else matters unless your max lvl in this game. Getting your skills is a side benefit but you need those att points and HP if you really want to get anywhere.

To be fair, Prophecies actually handled character progression fairly well, with the average character reaching level 20 around augury rock. That has of course been muddled with factions and heroes and runs and power levelers...... but the original intended character progression model was fairly well done. getting skills as quest rewards certainly helped as well to developing a character

but then factions came along and essentially killed all character progression standards...

Miral · Aug 01, 2007, 06:04 PM // 18:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by jkyarr

So the fact the game held no appeal to continue beyond noobieness is not construable as even an ounce of it's overall crappiness? The content beyond what I played may be the best gaming ever written... how would I know? If I can stand to slog through the initiation of "suffer the noobieness" zones then the rest of the content doesn't enter in to the discussion. That's the biggest darn shame of all. I obviously missed out on what many other people felt was the good part of the game because I decided not to pay my dues in newbie-land.

Was my experience typical? Perhaps not. Totally insignificant? Probably not. So if you're blizzard and you hear about my kind of experience happening do you say, "there may be something to this." Or do you take my 18 years of PC gaming expirence and chuck it, saying some self-consoling quip about how "this guy was a pussy. couldn't even hack the noob zones." and leave it at that? We like what we do so we're going to leave it like it is.... Ask Sony Online Entertainment how well that mantra has worked for them.

The key difference of course being that WoW has 9 million subscribers who also like what they're doing... if a million people complain then sure, they'd consider changing it up. but if only a hundred people have problems with the newbie experience, then ya, they're probably not going to exert the effort to change it.

Lonesamurai · Aug 01, 2007, 07:21 PM // 19:21

My personal opinion? WoW makes my stomach churn every time I see a screenshot of it... Hell, i nearly threw up seeing it on my housemates machine

However in all seriousness, WoW really is the ONLY game ever i have turned my nose up from the graphics alone... I'm not even willing to install it to try the 14 day trial

MSecorsky · Aug 01, 2007, 07:39 PM // 19:39

Funny... this chat reminds me of a video on you-tube I watched just yesterday... this guy's comparing the PvP elements of WoW and GW. Fifteen minute clip... the first fourteen is his level 34 (or so) elementalist(mage ?) running around looking for someone to kill, finally finds someone (warlock?) two levels higher and gets wiped. Rinse, repeat.

The last minute... saying you can't do that in GW (the random killing of people), a quick whine about the PvP arenas, and declaring WoW the PvP winner. The guy was completely clueless about GW PvP yet had it completely written off as non-existent.

Each game has aspects that it's fans like over the other, and both sides will never agree that GW's better, so let's just let it rest.

Miral · Aug 01, 2007, 08:03 PM // 20:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lonesamurai

My personal opinion? WoW makes my stomach churn every time I see a screenshot of it... Hell, i nearly threw up seeing it on my housemates machine

However in all seriousness, WoW really is the ONLY game ever i have turned my nose up from the graphics alone... I'm not even willing to install it to try the 14 day trial

seriously? they're not that bad when you turn all the options on. not great, but not bad. now, everquest pre-expansion.... that one gave me the feeling you describe.

DreamRunner · Aug 01, 2007, 08:04 PM // 20:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Miral

way to not read what I wrote at all. I'm saying something has more people BECAUSE it is better, not the other way around like you keep trying to say.

Huh? I know what you are saying and I'm disagreeing with you. Or you are agreeing with Zinger that WoW has better PvP because its more popular. Just because something has more publicity and is able to catch the public eye more does not make it better than something else.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gaidax

DreamRunner, please, spare me... I feel I am losing patience with you.

I won't start digging up posts like a forum shrew, but isn't that you who said things like: In WoW you need to sit in Stormwind or other major city and spam LFG to get a group, which is a COMPLETE BS totally, speaking straightly... Or Outland being instanced... Or inablity to find a random party outside cities. Make some self check, will you?

I still give you a benfit of a doubt, seing that you obviously played WoW, but at the same time I politely point out that your information about WoW is very outdated and your arguements based on it hold no water.

What is annoying is that you are obviously unaware of the changes that happened recently in WoW and spread information about how WoW felt and looked in 2005, which is quite simply false for 2007.

And that all while glorifying the "connect to the whole world" ability, which is possible in theory, but fails miserably in practice (everyone prefer home districts due to latency and language and there is pretty much no real player activity in international district, except for gold farmers/sellers and bots of course).

Your arguement about mostly instanced enviroment with "option" to connect to the whole world being superior to the static, persistent worlds of WoW is laughable at best. Social-wise it is a very well-known fact that a limited player amount persistent world is far superior to any kind of instanced world.

Even Anet realises that and wishes to have persistency in Guild Wars 2, as it is far superior to the current system where the life exists only in cities and everything outside is a dead, playerless desert.

You can, of course, try to prove with foam at your mouth that WoW sucks and that it is worthless and that GW beats it to dust, but seriosuly... do you honestly believe that a game with 9 million fully active subscribers is that bad? Is it simply Blizzard inventing some mind-control techniues which cause people to play their game? Heck no! People play WoW because it is an exceptionally good, well thought-out game!

In fact the only reason for me playing GW over WoW currently is that WoW is not casual friendly, but even then I acknowledge the progress Blizzard made in this field - Burning Crusade is much more casual friendly than original WoW and knowing blizzard - they will go on and make it better.

You are loosing patience? I could say that right back at you. But whoa, you really did troll more. So.. here we go. Again.

You won't go to find and backup your post? Heh fine but as to the things you said, yeah I did say that you need to stand in a major city and spam LFG. But unfortunately for you, its not BS, as you said, its actually a 1st hand perspective experience which you have no way to prove is right or wrong. Here is what I said

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamRunner

Though, its based on purely subjective, I actually found most people that I use to play WoW with within stormwind where they were advertising for people to join there guild. Not only that but also for LFG in IF. I actually played on a low-medi populated server and it was the only way for people to interact together, since it was difficult to meet anyone outside cities.

You think WoW always had a global LFG system? You think people used to meeting stones too? Hah! Oh wait you answered your own question

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gaidax

That was an ancient times before LFG channel and tool came to be. Nowadays it is pointless to LFG in cities and people are much more spread outside because of that.

Outland isn't instanced? I don't think that was my point at all. The Outlands is not a part of Azeroth at all, in fact I said its in different parts. "

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamRunner

Thats funny, because as I found, the world has two continents, then the Outlands, and then all of the dungeons. Seems like two major parts, the Outlands part and then all of the dungeons.

I thought maybe this will come across as the persistent world is broken up? If that did bring some confusion, then what, my bad?

Inability to find a group outside a city?! I never ever said that. I did say that the majority of people meet in cities. Which is subjective too. But you also agreed with me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamRunner

Oh please, are you seriously trying to tell me that people in WoW majority meet people when they are out doing quests? Hell no

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gaidax

I am seriously trying to tell you that a very significant amount of players meet each other by doing out of the city activity. Not majority, but there is a very high amount of spontaneous cooperation while doing simple outside PvE.

My experience in playing WoW is dated, yes. However my main arguments which I've always still held and still arguing is....

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamRunner

Thats why I had 3 points.
1. The WoW population in the U.S is around 2.25 million, not 8.
2. WoW population is broken up into servers, 100+ in the US alone.
3. You can play with the WHOLE world of GW, but not in WoW, which has less options in grouping with other people. eg. You can play with people in Europe and Asia but not in WoW. Its done, by servers.

What is really annoying is that you are not aware of the points I made with Bryant Again and I have to repeatably say the same point again. And as far as I know, you still don't play with people around world internationally in WoW.

Oh yes, the point in which I have been saying that WoW does not have. Nor does it have anything close to it. The international district and the connect to the world or the useless option in as you like to say. The useless option in which people like to take tournaments in PvP and versing guilds across the world and the useless option which allows friends and family to play together who are overseas apart.

So now you are saying my arguments are petty while WoW is so much better. I like these internet insults. But you know, its so laughable, yet GW has it the option and WoW doesn't. Its so laughable, that you can change your region 6x and WoW doesn't even let you choose your region. I'm really interested in this well known fact about a persistent world world being so much better social-wise since both can give advantages.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com....php?id=161479

"How much of the sequel will be instance-based, and how much persistent? There's been talk that the whole thing is persistent, but that's not the case then...?

Jeff Strain: No, the foremost goal of Guild Wars 2 is to make it the ultimate Guild Wars for Guild Wars fans. Guild Wars charted new territory, not only with its business model but with a very innovative design, and a large part of that innovative design was the way we utilised instancing technology to tell this more direct story.

We're not going to let that go, it's one of the most powerful features of Guild Wars 1 and one of the features we think really makes it stand out. So that will still be a core foundation of Guild Wars 2. But we want to use the addition of persistent world to also explore other types of gameplay.

So no, it's absolutely not the case that we're dropping instancing technology, we'll continue to carry that forward because we think it's one of the foundational pillars of Guild Wars."

When have I said WoW sucked? I swear someone else said the same thing as you did. But ahh! So if it's a popular game, it must be good. I guess going by the masses... what they say... like sheep is a good thing. However, why popularity is not always better is a different topic.

I have no idea what this has to do with WoW being mind controlled by blizzard but what not, so whatever. I'll post soon for Bryant Again but this is all for now. See you soon!

jkyarr · Aug 01, 2007, 08:31 PM // 20:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Having 2, 14 day, spances of trial time into a game may give you a little bit of insight, but hardly makes you effectively capable of judging it wouldn’t you agree?

What's needed for a judgment to be made? I'm not purporting to be an expert evaluator of the whole game that is WoW, but I'm not about to say that I can't draw a conclusion from the experience I had with it, nor am I dismissive enough to say that my evaluation is completely irrelevant. Most of the evaluations I made are constants throughout the game regardless of level. Or do I get to quit paying the monthly fee once I reach 70th level? I'm not trying to claim that a WoW gameplay goes the way my experience went in the noobie zones. I'm just pointing out that that experience was horrible enough that I had no desire to continue and was left with no hope of the circumstances changing. Maybe I chickened out... Maybe I cut my losses before they were realized.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Again nothing wrong with having a family life, but should your demographic be looking at an rpg directed solely at them, I mean traditionally rpgs need to have to that level of commitment its part of the fullfillment of the game. You work hard your character gets stronger, you can do more stuff, you cant get stronger etc. Nothing wrong with making it possible to play casually but if it makes the game suffer as a whole (and in an rpg it does) its probably not a good idea.

I agree with you mostly here, however I think there is still room for improvement in what qualifies as good RPG gameplay. Character development doesn't have to equate to player masochism. There is better middle ground still to be achieved by both blizzard and Anet, as far as what satisfying, available and meaningful character development really is. GW isn't really an RPG, submersion-wise. WoW is an overwrought, overly taxing RPG. For me the fun went out of making the effort.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Trust me its not limited to a monthly subscription fee based game. I used to really love what GW could have been, but one mistake followed by a stupid cover-up after another led me to your "had enough" conclusion. Now in a subscription based game thats going to hurt the game makers and they will have to do something to fix it or else lose their source of income, however in the free based play they can afford to ignore you. Theyll just say "its a casual game, put it down for now and come back when your excited about new content" ;p. I mean they blew a lotta smoke to get you to buy the 1st one they can blow even more smoke tell you buy the "fix" for the problem and you might be tempted to go for it cause its "free play," and there are some good things you like about it...

I agree that this is not solely a side-effect of paying a subscription, I'm just saying that having experienced both breaking points, with a subscription game, and a free game, the fact that you're paying for it with subscription games made that breaking point all that much more bitter for me.

As for the game shops listening to your input, I have no experience with blizzard so I won't evaluate them. SOE was the worst. They pretended to listen and then produced nerfs when they couldn't ever provide evidence of them being requested. They blatantly went their own direction regardless of the player input. Anet has, in my experience, been hands-down, the most actively communicating and responsive game maker I've ever purchased. But I also think that the evaluation has to go beyond "I asked them for X and they never put it in the game." A macro-perspective is what is relevant, and from all the evidence I can gather Anet is stupendous in this regard.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Well if your opinion is the graphics arent as good thats fine, but to me theyre ok in both games... way better than my early days of Atari and Nintendo... but the game itself should be the main focus if it looks good thats a bonus. By your reasoning I should have Blue-Ray or whatever the new HD DVD stuff is to replace my old DVD collection cause it "looks better." To me the difference is negligible.

I wouldn’t have taken any issue in this regard if you had said "I should have PS3 to replace my Nintendo 64 graphics because it looks better." That would be much closer to the difference in graphics quality between GW and WoW. But hey, if you can't tell the difference, ignorance is bliss. Camp away in cartoon-land.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Two 14 day trial hardly makes you an expert. Theres soooooo many things to do in WoW and soooooo many servers that I doubt that 100% all your neccesary quests were taken up. Again I think its your lack of experience more than actual valid judgement.

Who claimed expertise? And prove a correlation between the amount of time spent and the amount of expertise gained. And in case you missed the timeframe of my 2 trials they were 3 and 8 months after the game issued. There were still massive server crowding problems 3 months after release in case you wondered. The SOOO MANY SERVERS you mention took time to come online. By 8 months I don't know why my experience was so similar. Plum bad luck evidently. To give it a little more context, I was joining the servers where my paying friends were already playing, as most people who were given trial subscriptions would have done. All those new empty servers just waiting to snatch up new players were irrelevant.

I really don't see how all this adds up to lack of experience. My evaluation isn't of ALL the content that is in WoW. It's a reflection of the admittedly small amount of it I could tolerate. Now provide an argument that substantiates that my evaluation of that portion of the game is not a valid judgment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Again you played zero time in the game and if you only got to lvl 8 you experienced 1% of the game content im sure.

So what you're saying is that I can take your wife on 2 different 14 day vacations and diddle her an average of 6 hours a day the whole duration of the vacation and then come back and say "The amount of time I've spent diddling your wife is zero. No judgment can be made about whether or not we did, in fact, diddle, because, over all, neither of us have spent enough of our lives diddling to be authoritative on what it is. Sorry I'm only a level 8 diddler so I can't definitely say." Your wife better be hot because I'm showing up on your doorstep tomorrow. Tell her to pack her lingerie.

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Originally Posted by Despozblehero

If by genre you mean RPG well FF beat GW, if by MMORPG well GW PvE content is really in all honesty lacking. Its doubtful to convice you of this I'm sure so I wont even try, but in terms of character development, storyline, quests, ways in which to interract with people and the surrounding world, all are lacking in GW imho from an MMORPG standpoint... and if in that "travel time" I run across people hey I may end up playing with them or killing monsters on the way to gain some loot/exp great!, its not like its mindless walking like you make it out to be with your oh so wise lvl 8 world walking experience... As for Instances.... You know of the WoW instances obviously, again lvl 8 (although theres plenty of low lvl instances in WoW . If walking is your only problem well dont play an RPG you pretty much gotta do that.

FF beat GW... sorry I missed how this was relevant to the discussion of innovation. I'd classify GW as an MMO, not an MMORPG. Over the existence of the genre I would agree that FF (Final Fantasy, right? But is FF an MMO?) is unmatched, but as for recent innovations I still feel GW is top innovator.

Walking is a problem for me in games. After living through the pre-mounts and pre-vehicles era of SWG I think anybody can understand why. Mounts, soul-stones, and griffons were all addons attempting to amend what blizzard obviously viewed as an imbalance also. Fighting your way through a zone the first time is one thing. Even having to fight your way back if the zone has been retaken by hostiles or having random encounters as you map across zones is another, both entirely different from having to hack and slash your way across a zone each and every time you visit a locality. WoW as it now is, has improved in this regard, as you pointed out. But it still is not as to my liking as map travel in GW is.

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Originally Posted by Despozblehero

Well in WoW if a lvl 70 kills something and has a like lvl 5 in the party the lvl will get none to little exp, GW has power levelers though lol. GW may have once been skill orientented but not anymore... the encounter variation is neglegible and really only affects monks. Most monster mobs are taken out the same way dont aggro to much lure them to you and hit 1234 1234 1234: repeat. Takes no skill trust me, one of my biggest gripes with GW PvE is its skilless. Even the higher-end stuff, which imho is worse cause its like 6 hours of running around skillessly.

nice to hear they've implemented a mechanism to prevent level 70s from power leveling level 5s, but I think you exaggerated deliberately in an attempt to put WoW in a good light. A 15th level grouping with a 5th level is still power-leveling. And yes there's power leveling and twinking in GWs too. Your evaluation of the "Skilllessness" of GW is exaggerated too. By mechanism GW and WoW don't differ as far as how activating the use of one's skills goes, so your 1234 comments bear little value. Interesting that you exclude monks from the rest. Was that because my ID on the thread says I play a monk? BTW I also have a highly accomplished warrior and elementalist and I have to disagree with your evaluation completely. If you want to prove your point to me then change your skill screen in GW so that you only see the pictures instead of the skill names and then sort them in some way that you're not used to seeing, randomly pic any 8 skills to fill your skill bar, do the same for any heroes in your group and the randomly complete your party without selecting any particular henchmen on purpose. Then use that team to complete the 3 fire island chain quests in prophecies, bonuses and all. Now do the same thing over only this time purposefully select each of your skills and your heros skills and carefully choose which henchmen to round out your group. If you complete those 3 missions and bonuses in the same amount of time regardless of which skills are in your skill bar, then I will concede your "Skillless" point.

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Originally Posted by Despozblehero

atm in GW if youre NOT 20 you insta-suck and stay on noob isle/ascalon for proph (which is small/secluded) theres nothing to do for a mid-range level character so rush rush rush to get that 20 cause nothing else matters unless your max lvl in this game.

Tell that to the group of 20th level idiots my 12th level mesmer grouped with the other night... I out-survived them all and then forced them to either bail from the mission or wait for the next 1/2 hour while I successfully soloed it to completion.

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Originally Posted by Despozblehero

3.5 million copies sold world wide, 1 big empty friend/guild list... Actions>Words

not sure what your point was here... but I can identify. I don't think any of the guilds we started with originally still exist. But this begins a whole different discussion about when it becomes worth it to solo rather than participate in a guild. I've been a loner in GW for a while now and that’s how I prefer it. I can't have a guild putting requirement on my gaming time to play a certain build or make a certain character or be here or there for this particular guild raid at thus and such a time. That's a recipe for either my wife or my guildmates ending up pissed.

jkyarr · Aug 01, 2007, 08:46 PM // 20:46

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Originally Posted by MSecorsky

Funny... this chat reminds me of a video on you-tube I watched just yesterday... this guy's comparing the PvP elements of WoW and GW. Fifteen minute clip... the first fourteen is his level 34 (or so) elementalist(mage ?) running around looking for someone to kill, finally finds someone (warlock?) two levels higher and gets wiped. Rinse, repeat.

The last minute... saying you can't do that in GW (the random killing of people), a quick whine about the PvP arenas, and declaring WoW the PvP winner. The guy was completely clueless about GW PvP yet had it completely written off as non-existent.

Each game has aspects that it's fans like over the other, and both sides will never agree that GW's better, so let's just let it rest.

/places lips on peace-pipe

Bryant Again · Aug 01, 2007, 09:10 PM // 21:10

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Originally Posted by jkyarr

What's needed for a judgment to be made?

I'd say a standard amount of gametime under your belt, I'd say at least to 60. Again, it's not fair how you're judging/evaluating WoW based on such a small portion of the game. Is it fair for me to say "I find the gameplay in Guild Wars highly lackluster" when I'm level 6 and still in Pre-searing?

Ritual del Fuego · Aug 01, 2007, 09:54 PM // 21:54

I have played over 1k hours of GW (I know not alot by some people's standards on this board but enough to have a decent opinion) and have recently started playing WoW a the behest of most of my friends. I currently have a level 41 druid in WoW with I'm guessing about 150 hrs of game time so enough to have an educated opinion on the game I would think.

I don't have time to read the entire thread but in my opinion they both have their good qualities and weaknesses and in the end are both very good games. If you like a RPG storyline where you are working toward a certain end, GW is superior IMO. If you like a game that more mimics a role playing second life, WoW is probably a little stronger due to the open world, professions, etc. Personally I enjoy both and don't see why one has to be considered better than the other. Everyone likes different things in a game and that is why there are so many on the market. I guess my point is no one can tell you whether you will like a game, you should just try it yourself and decide for yourself.

Lonesamurai · Aug 01, 2007, 10:20 PM // 22:20

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Originally Posted by Miral

seriously? they're not that bad when you turn all the options on. not great, but not bad. now, everquest pre-expansion.... that one gave me the feeling you describe.

Funny thing is? I was and i still am a big fan of Warcraft 3 and teh graphics... It has that cartoony style, but the graphics looks more... "realistic"? does that make sense?

As if the WoW graphics went too far the cartoony way