Sunday 18 May 2008

A whole new world



Up until last night I had been on an endless stream of 13 hour night shifts. I'm not after sympathy here, far from it. I say this to give you an idea of how tired I was at 2am this morning when I finally logged out after my first session of Age of Conan!

I was one of the lucky ones who managed to get into the early access program and have therefore been happily running round DoT'ing things with unholy necromancer goodness!

Anyway, I figured that while my server was down for 2 hours maintenance, I could jump back in here and give you my impressions of the first 20 levels. I'm not going to go into too much detail as other websites such as Massively have done a far better job.

Overall, I'm pretty damned happy with the game.

OK, next topic.

Just kidding!

If you've read my other stuff, you'll know that quests are a bit of a gripe of mine. I always get a bit disheartened when venturing into a new game only to be confronted by some farmer who has a real issue with boars eating his fucking turnips etc.

But so far, FunCom has done a pretty good job with the interaction with quest givers. Instead of the standard accept/decline option, you have the ability to actually converse with your target much like the response options in the Knights of The Old Republic games. My particular preference at the moment is using the sarcastic options and being generally rude to the NPCs! I know they don't have feelings etc but it's nice to break from the standard format and be given a free reign.

The starter quests, up until you reach Tortage (the first multiplayer town zone), are nicely simple and introduce you to most of the common UI features. The first NPC who introduces himself to you upon your arrival on the beach also starts you down your personal storyline, a feature similar to LoTRO epic quest chapters. The main difference between these two being that, in AoC, you carry out the personal story in singleplayer mode at night time and are unable to receive help from your friends.

But by far the happiest point on this subject so far is that there have been decidedly few 'kill ten rats' quests.

/happy dance!

The combat system is fairly straightforward and doesn't take long to get to grips with. My friends seem quite happy with the melee side of things but I can only comment from a caster perspective. Each class has their mainstay spells and attacks which will all seem and look fairly similar up to about lvl 17.

Don't get me wrong here, they do look good. But I'm kinda waiting to see how spellweaving turns out, so stay tuned for more on that as I progress. You can't really expect a game to throw out their best stuff in the first five minutes of a game or you wouldn't be quite so impressed later on...or willing to journey there to find out what's waiting.

My only real grievance here so far is the UI. As well laid out as it is, there are a few tweaks or options which could have made things better imho.

Firstly, your bottom hotkey bar is quite blocky and takes up quite a bit of space. It has a similar sort of feel to the GuildWars design but you aren't limited to sticking with a set choice of spells or attacks.

Because you use the first 3 boxes for your melee attacks, you are effectively only left with 7 spaces to assign to spells/attacks. Now, even though you have other spaces you can assign to your other attacks, I always prefer to have everything close together so that I don't have to move my cursor around too much when I'm in a fight. You can see what I mean from my WoW UI below.



Regarding the melee attack buttons, although it is possible to move them, they are bound to the 1,2,3 keys which makes it really easy to use them if you are an old WASD user like myself. Hence you don't really want to bother moving them.

Second, there are 2 other rows that you can use but they aren't positioned in the most ideal place. Couple this with the fact that a misclick can make them re-align themselves horizontally (as default they are aligned vertically down the right-hand edge of the screen) and half your spells are now somewhere off screen!

But then you take a look at the distinctly non-cartoony graphics, the lush detail in the environment, the vast openness of the zones and you don't mind quite so much.

The one bit of praise I still have for Blizzard is in one of the few things I hope that FC will decide to follow and allow users to design mods for the UI. If we are eventually able to alter the UI to our own preferences then this will be a serious contender in my eyes.

Anyway, the servers are coming back shortly so I'll sign off for now. But keep checking back for updates.

Monday 12 May 2008

Just don't

Seriously.

Do NOT click this link:

D T D

Don't say I haven't warned you.

This blogger and website accept no responsibility in whole or part for any loss of individuals' time or sanity incurred through clicking this link.

3 hours today...gone...just like that. I think it appeals to the obsessive compulsive in me!

Sunday 11 May 2008

Beta =/= Free Game

Massively recently reported on the current use of Beta testing with regards to upcoming game releases; in particular several big name game developers using this period in an MMOs life as a kind of publicity campaign instead of the 'intended' usage.

Now, coming from a non-advertising background as I do, I can see a certain amount of logic in this decision. What better way to get free publicity than to allow hundreds of adoring fanbois early access to your game to see all the shiney new concepts you've incorporated?

Clever huh? All those forums and fansites, eager to get news of your latest product. Let them in, let them drool and let them run off to talk to their friends.

...NDA or not.

On the other hand, what if you've not done as well as you thought?

What if your game doesn't have quite the impact you'd hoped it would?

Kinda shot yourself in the foot there, huh? I suppose at this point, the 'it's only Beta' defence would come out to play. But let's not get too far off track here.

The point of this post is, not just to bitch at these companies, but to highlight the growing trend of 'Beta Freeloaders' as I've come to call them.

If, like me, you've ever spent some time in the aforementioned testing, chances are you've met these people - they're quite easily recognisable.

Let us discuss their defining characteristics to allow for ease of identification in the future...

1) General Whine-a-lot
/1 OMFG WTF, WHY DONT THE CRAFTING STATIONS WORK...THIS CLASS IS SO BROKEN...GODDAMN PLACEHOLDER QUEST REWARDS AGAIN LOL...FFS I'M STUCK IN THE TELEPORT PAD AGAIN...WHERE IS MY CAPSLOCK KEY?

This person has an incessant need to highlight every...single...fault they find in game using the power of General Chat. God forbid they actually figure out what the /bug or /report functions are for.

And use them.

Christ, if they actually ever did what they were supposed to, games would ship in near-mint condition!

2) Mr Experience
"When I was in 'X' MMO Beta they totally did things different, these devs are like sooo behind the times"

Bow to the wisdom of this tester. If you spend more than 5 minutes listening to him/her, they'll have you believing that they are single-handedly responsible for helping to solve 85% of the bugs in all the previous MMOs they've been involved in.

Gets all their info from reading other forums.

Has never tested before.

Has probably only ever played WoW.

3) The 'Rival Game Developer'
"FFS, are you kidding me? A memory leak? This shouldn't have made it out of Alpha. It'll never release on time. You guys heard about the new Bioware MMO?"

This guy is like a nerfed version of General whine-a-lot but more insidious. Instead of highlighting a blissful ignorance of testing by spamming the chat channels, he/she seldom speaks except to make pointedly relevant but negative comments. His understanding of game mechanics means that his comments occasionally carry some weight with those who notice.

His manifesto consists solely of killing the game before it even launches.

Probably works for Blizzard.

4) The uninformed Beta Virgin

"Well, doesn't look like I'll be buying this...too many bugs *sigh*. When does Warhammer come out, LOL"

Actually thinks that the game will ship in it's current form.

Unfortunately, he/she is probably right.

It's this last character that we should dwell on for a second as it's the crux of this issue. As much as developers are prepared to take the risk of using Beta as a publicity exercise and as much as they are prepared to let as many people into their game in its final round of testing as possible, this practice is hurting them far more than it's helping them.

By using this system, they are encouraging more and more of a certain type of gamer into their Beta stage. The type who are using that period to decide whether or not this is a game that they might like to spend some money on.

A place where they could settle for a while.

Unfortunately, these people are just playing a demo as far as they're concerned. They are looking at a game with a very narrow view. Instead of trying to break the game and help the developers by highlighting faults and bugs, they're just doing the normal run of the mill stuff like questing and grinding.

The knock-on effect is that many of the faults experienced by players, who actually go out and explore, will never have been reported to the devs prior to the general release.

I'm not saying that developers should screen their testers, I mean that's not even practicable...is it?

*mental note to self: consider drafting a 'Tester Tard Test'*

Even hiring a team of 'button-mashers' wouldn't help your cause either. No, what you do want is a tester who goes out and tries to do the stuff that you aren't supposed to be able to do.

The player who wall-walks entire zones just to try and find a way to drop through the world.

The player who tries to make objects and items do things they were never designed to do.

The game-breaking type of stuff.

I sincerely think that one of the main reasons so many games in recent years have been released with questionable content and problems comes down to inadequate testing. Developers are resigned to the fact that the majority of bugs will make it through the Beta phase and will be dealt with on general release.

I'm not for a second saying that the publishing/distribution companies behind the game don't play a fucking HUGE part in this equation, but that's an extra can of worms I don't even want to consider opening right now.

Gamers in a lot of MMOs lately have effectively been paying to Beta test for the first few months in the life of a new release. I'm not going to point fingers at any game in particular but I'm sure quite a lot of you already have a game or two in mind.

I know I do.

But the bottom line is this: companies need to realise that releasing substandard products is not an option. Players need to realise that if they're going to apply for a slot in testing, they need to actually test the game...not test-drive it.

After all, the future of the game you are testing now is firmly in your hands. If the game launches and fails and you didn't give 100% to reporting glitches, bugs and crashes, you are at least partly to blame for its failure.

All I ask is that you think on this for more than 2 seconds before you eSign that next NDA.

/2cents

Thursday 8 May 2008

As time goes by.

So, as I count down the final days until my pre-order code from Play.com arrives (allowing me to get into Hyboria on the 17th instead of the 23rd!), I've been sat at my keyboard twiddling my thumbs.

For the first time in as long as I can remember, I am literally bored shitless online.

If you've bothered to read more than a few articles back from this point, this should come as no great shock to you.

I'm not gonna sit here and moan about Blizzard's recent attempts to keep their players happy til the expansion. Nor am I going to whine about how annoying it can be in Tabula Rasa when every single mission reward comes from a pool of about 8 items.

Besides, that would be too easy :P

After night shift the other day, I came home from work and sat staring at the shortcuts to all the different games on my desktop. In the space of about 5 minutes I'd logged into WoW to check my bank characters mail, logged into TR to see if any of the guys I quest with were on, checked 4 different ventrilo servers I happen to frequent and opened up several tabs for the different forums I troll.

Then I booted up Steam and went on a rampage with the 'zero-point energy weapon' in HL2 Ep2.

Patience.

Patience is the only thing keeping me from smashing my head against the wall in frustration at the moment.

Patience born of the knowledge that something good is right around the corner.

My friends in the AoC beta have kept me up to speed on the last few days of the open testing and I'm looking forward to joining them when the servers go live. But, as much as I'm looking forward to its release, there's a part of me that is craving something else.

For too long now have Elves, Dwarves and Orcs dominated the MMO environment.

Something has to give soon and, in the absence of Star Trek Online, there is only one contender remaining.

Whether Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment can pull the proverbial rabbit out of the hat is something I look forward to finding out. The fact remains that there has been a disturbing absence in the MMO market now for a while.

...and it's time it made a come-back.

Please do not think for a second that I'm speaking disparriagingly about titles such as EVE etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. But I guess it would be fair to say that I'm still looking for a replacement for SWG. A good expansive MMO with good character progression, a large, dedicated community and great content.

I believe that, given the popularity of the Stargate series at this time, the title has a fair chance of scoring with the many fans of Sci-Fi. When people don't get exactly what they want, they tend to make do with whatever they can get...the best of what's left.

My feeling is that this reflects the current state of play for lovers of my favourite genre. Hence why so many people are currently running heroic Magisters Terrace rather than pining for an energy weapon and starfighter cockpits.

If you are curious to see what is currently brewing over in the Stargate encampment, head on over to the forums. As with most game forums prior to the release, there is a mass of speculation. But if you sift through some of it, you'll stumble across an interview with a conceptual artist here, a gameplay developer there and so on.

If what I've read is any indication on what is to come, the future is looking a little brighter as far as I'm concerned.

All they need to do now is get themsleves sorted, plan a space sim expansion for about a year down the line complete with capital ships and fighters and you wont see me for dust!

Thursday 1 May 2008

Unstoppable Force Vs Immovable Object

I spent a considerable amount of time last night reading and re-reading an article hosted by Warcry.

The article documented a meeting where a number of notable persons from leading game development companies recently got together to discuss the ‘current state of the MMO’.

If you've found your way here and are still reading this then I'm sure you'll agree that it's a noble and worthy topic.

During the course of what I’m sure would have been an interesting conversation to eavesdrop on (I would love to read the unedited highlights!), more than just a few references were made to World of Warcraft.

This worries me somewhat if I’m being completely honest.

If you look at any of the reviews written on MMO’s released in the last few years, you’ll notice a disturbing trend of comparing them to Blizzard’s behemoth. Seriously, go check out PCGamer, PCFormat and their ilk.

The genre or style of the new release could be galaxies apart from WoW, but still it is rated on whether it may have the potential to topple Blizzard from its ivory tower.

When CEOs of major companies start making these comparisons and express hesitance and even negativity at the possibility of outdoing WoW, God kills a LOLcat!

Now, on the one hand, I can see that it’s a fair enough standpoint to take. If you consider the sheer number of people playing WoW, it means that any comparisons made will be understood by more people who now have a benchmark against which to measure.

But is it necessary? Can a game not be judged on its own merits?

Blizzard took tried and tested formulae and created an MMO that was easily accessible. They made a world which appealed to gamers who had never considered MMOs before with its easy user interface and 'kill ten rats' system.

But, with the exception of their scripted raid encounters, what did they do that was new? Ok, so they made the core graphics of the game accessible for people running on lower end systems, which gave them an even larger playerbase to get their greedy paws on.

But what else in the way of 'groundbreaking'? I would say 'very little' tbh.

The whole argument for innovation in upcoming releases is fairly self evident. The market is currently stagnating with old ideas dressed up to look new and exciting. Something needs to be done to jumpstart MMO gamers back to life. A responsibility which lies solely with the latest generation of devs.

In laymans terms, what the gaming world needs is a steel toe capped kick square in the family jewels.

WoW is causing developers to think twice about taking them head on in the fantasy genre due to the failures of recent releases. The choice between fighting for a share of Warcrafts paying customers or carving out a niche corner in the market is becoming less of a decision and more a foregone conclusion.

Will AoC change that? Stay tuned to find out.

Even companies which have gained access to the intellectual property of a well known brand are not always granted to produce dead certs these days. One only has to look as far as Lord of the Rings online to see how things can turn out.

And then there's the payment method and the microtransaction vs subscription argument. But that's a whole other can of worms.

Basically, it is going to take a company with a decent bankroll to produce something remarkable enough for people to sit up and take notice...and a fairly large pair of balls to stand up and say “WoW, your days are numbered”

I have my ideas on what is needed and I’m sure you do too. All we need now is someone brave…a visionary…to take these dreams and make them a reality.

No, Richard Garriott, not you.
Go sit in the 'naughty corner' and Shh!

Anyway, the source post can be found here. But before I sign off for this entry, I wanted to share one thing with you that really caught my eye in this article.

To say that I almost fell off my chair laughing when I got to this point would be like saying that the Pope is just a little bit Catholic!

I quote Mr John Smedley of Sony Online Entertainment (the people responsible for Star Wars Galaxies):

"We have the job of making great games, running great games and innovating. I think you have to balance it. If you go too crazy with innovation, you might drive your loyal customers out."


Am I the only one who finds this ironic?

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Mr John Smedley…

/tumbleweed

/golfclap

The ‘balance’ and ‘enhancements’ made to Star Wars Galaxies in the name of innovation were single handedly responsible for driving away loyal fans of the game by the hundreds and thousands.

Either he is finally realising his mistakes a few years too late or he really needs to practice what he preaches!

A casters wet dream

During my shift last night at work, I was aimlessly drifting through my route of favourite sites as usual, looking for a juicy morsel of MMO related news when I saw a shining light off in to the distance.

It beckoned me ever closer, begging to be /inspected. On closer examination I discovered that the report staring back at me from the monitor was nothing short of manna from Heaven.

Before I go any further, take a gander at this...



Yes, that's really a player controlled character.

Yes, it does look totally awesome!

If you take a look at any current MMO which has a caster class or two, what do you see? Yet another glass cannon who wiggles his or her fingers, before unleashing a bolt of fire/ice/shadow/lightning.

What if you could do more?

What if you could enter a casting state where energy and magic continue to build, throwing more and more spells into a giant melting pot before finally being unleashed?

Now you can.

The future is bright...

The future is Spellweaving.

Now the balance monkeys out there will probably already be shouting 'NERF!' but I say 'slow down there monkey boy'. What if, although the power of the spells were drastically increased, the chances of doing lethal damage to yourself was also a large factor for consideration?

Clever huh?

The information released by FunCom to IGN goes on to say that, once the caster enters the spellweaving state, it progresses through 6 stages.

According to Andrew Griffin, FunCom's senior systems designer, each stage will grant an increase to passive spell buff damage but will also have the chance to land a harmful or helpful effect to the caster.

As far as I am aware, this is a fairly revolutionary concept when it comes to empowering us of the 'squishy persuasion'. The ability of players to mix up different spells to create unique attacks based on their adversaries is an innovative move.

Granted there can only be so many combinations available, but when you mix in the chance of a helpful side effect kicking in, it adds that extra spice to make things interesting.

I'm sure as players progress and their characters become more powerful, we will see casters throwing out FOTM nukes at poor unsuspecting healers in PvP. That is all but inevitable. But it gives me hope.

Hope that, some developers are starting to realise that gamers aren't just going to sit back and take badly written code and rehashed quests thrown at them anymore . We need advancements in concepts and storylines alike to keep our interest alive.

Instead of choosing to bank on old tried and tested game mechanics, developers should be constantly trying to push the virtual envelope.

Those who disregard this simple fact will see the gaming community vote with the only weapon they have available.

Their wallets.

Anyway, before I go off on a tangent, head on over to IGN.com for the full source post . It will give you a more in-depth view on how it will all work and save me the effort of plagiarising the article!

...And over here to the right

Now that I appear (to the untrained eye) to be getting into the swing of this blogging malarky, I've decided to get a little adventurous and start adding new features.

In the column to the right you will now find links to the work of one Mr Durgan Kael - the aforementioned Star Wars Galaxies, PvP aficionado.

In his spare time, he presents a news broadcast on all the news thats new and approved (and occasionally morally questionable) about his beloved MMO.

Anyways, I hope you like the show, courtesy of SlamCentralStudios and hosted by Youtube.