It just so happens that World of Warcraft FINALLY did something with the Diku model that we were given back in the early 90’s. Everquest stole the Diku formula, fucked it up, and now tries to take credit for being a “forefather”. It was the first 3d mass market MMORPG… and nothing more. It actually restricted the market through very poor implementation more than anything. World of Warcraft came along and translated the formula into something that is actually FUN to play. In doing so WoW didn’t rip anything off. Blizzard simply made a better foozle bashing simulation.

What is the point of all this drivel?

The Diku style works. The ideas behind it work. The improvements that have been made to it like WoW’s questing system are great. There is no reason a company should not borrow the idea. It makes sense to give player’s a reason to go out and bash the foozles!!! This is by far not an award winning idea, it is a simple progression of the format.

LotRO does this just fine. However, that is the ONLY part of LotRO that feels, looks, or tastes like World of Warcraft. Instead of ! points, you run to NPCs with rings over their head. In the grand scheme of things you are still killing foozles, but you have a quest telling you to do so. That is an action people have been doing in games for AGES! Why it took the MMORPG market so long to figure it out is beyond me. So, it is like WoW in that aspect, but by far it is not something that was ripped off!

I don’t want to spoil my entire review, but there is nothing else that feels like WoW in LotRO. Crafting… no. Combat… slower and boring. World… bleh. Story… blah. Controls… blah. Graphics… good, but “flat”.