Really, if avoiding the typical grind was the goal, the game after Tortage should have been scrapped. Maybe give the players the first ten levels of Tortage, then slowly release another level every month as the rest of the game is trickled in. Continue an interactive story thusly.

If a game rings true with me at the beginning during the trial I’ll throw money at it straight away, but not if my free trial is me playing the full game on a friend’s computer.

WoW’s not bad for this… you can always (as far as I can recall) see the quest mobs for the initial quest from the NPC who gives the quest. So it isn’t “run wayyyy over in that direction until you see something that might be a target”, it’s “kill those things right over there”.

I think there’s a balance to be struck in tutorials between introducing the complete novice to a wholly new game and gaming system, and introducing a player well versed in the genre to the specifics of this game. My bias is to err on the side of simplicity but allow players to skip any or all of the tutorial. That way total newbs aren’t overwhelmed, and more experienced players aren’t held back.

AoC’s Tortage sequence was very well produced, but that’s not the tutorial. The tutorial was the single-player island sequence before arriving at Tortage. It was honestly a bit on the long side but well polished and generally fun, and did provide most of the explanation needed while allowing for exploration and experimentation (e.g. if you swam into the lagoon behind where you spawned, you’d find a treasure chest underwater). Though the rails were pretty explicit (and arguably need to be in tutorials) the island sequence had hidden content and the ability to skip sections, albeit with the price of being underprepared for later sections.

I’ve become a firm believer in humble beginnings for an RPG, character-wise at least. That can be hard to translate that into great and glorious, although as Julian comments, it’s more important that it just feels right (and hey, I’ll give a nod to any Soylent Green reference). I dunno, maybe I’m an RPG snob, but I think RPG players can generally get a good idea of whether the game reaches what they want, without being overly harsh on the opening sequences.

… Addendum:

Just because it was brought up: Soylent Green has the distinction of the first film reference of a videogame. A pre-Atari Computer Space is highlighted, although sadly it was painted white instead of its usual metal-fleck disco splendor.

Now, if you’ve ever played Computer Space, I’d say it’s a very poor first experience for games. Horrible, horrible game.

I can put up with a long road to awesome as long as that road is tight, varied and attractive. If I start sniffing “the proper grind” early on that discourages me to keep walking the path, tight as it might be.

Another thing: I will always gravitate heavily towards games that offer marked and distinct variety in the experience of the starting areas and first third or fourth of the game. Not just cosmetics, but quest types, motivations, introductions to the world, etc.

Subjective comment of the year: All this is overridden by games that just feel right. If a game feels right, I’ll play it. And I will not explain this, first because I can’t, and second because it’s like Soylent Green; varies from person to person.

AoC and DarkFall are two examples of this. AoC is a lie 1-20, as anyone who bases their purchase decision on the 1-20 game is going to feel cheated. DarkFall on the other hand just drops you into the world and vaguely tells you to go kill goblins (if you even know to pick up the quest). However, at no point since the first minute does DarkFall turn into something else, what you can do in the first minutes is what the game is about. If that works for you, you won’t be disappointed, and if it does not at least you know right away.

WoW is that odd middle ground, where the leveling is great, but then the game does a 180 at the level cap. You have to ‘grind’ through 1-80 if you like endgame, or the game ‘ends’ when you hit the cap if you like leveling/questing.