Author: Ravious

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[LOTRO] Go Your Own Enedwaith

I am significantly behind the herd in Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO) since I took my prodigal sabbatical just a little after Enedwaith’s release. I think what really ran me off was the early parts of Book 2 (Vol. 3) in getting the rangers to even get to Enedwaith from Eriador. In hindsight I should have enjoyed some of Enedwaith and then returned back to the epic line of quests.

I have just completed perhaps a third to a half of Enedwaith coming from the North downward as I haphazardly follow the Book quests. I must say that I am really enjoying the design of this zone. It feels like a refreshing return. There is the old comfortable with a bit of new flash. It is actually getting me pretty excited to hit Dunland, the next zone.

The story of Enedwaith is one of flux. Rangers in the Grey Company are traveling southward trying to ensure a safe route through tribal lands. The tribes are dealing with enemies and allies of the Grey Company, Saruman the White, and other tribes themselves. And, so far, the Enemy seems to have less of a stabilized power base than the half-orc companies in Eregion to the North. The theme of this zone is really well done, at least in the northern half of the zone. I will have to see if it changes as I hit the main town and a possible dwarven area. Continue reading [LOTRO] Go Your Own Enedwaith

[LOTRO] Sensible Folk

My captain is legendary. His name has been sung across Eriador, in the depths of Moria, and his legend is swiftly growing east of the Misty Mountains. The captains latest tales tell of crippling Dol Guldur’s armies. During his journey into Enedwaith, he happened upon a lost colony of hobbits. Good folk living on their own in some small canyonlands. Some big, armored galoomph comes along, and what do they ask of this god walking among mere mortals to do as a token of friendship. Well this picture has a couple dozen words:

Turbine devs doing this kind of reminds me what Viktor Taransky (Pacino) did to his digitally created star in the movie Simone. I expect to be cleaning horse stalls in Rohan as part of mounted combat pre-training.*

–Ravious

*mounted combat not confirmed, as far as I know.

[LOTRO] A Tale of Re-Entry

I deftly evaded the siren song of the Dark Side (for now, even with Grandma Christmas Cash burning a hole in my pocket), and decided to reinstall Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO). Me and the Tolkien MMO go pretty far back, and except for Guild Wars, it ranks as the number one MMO for time played in my book. It is number one if you don’t think Guild Wars is a “true” MMO. Anyway, I have been taking a long sabbatical from the game since the Mirkwood expansion and the Free-2-Play (F2P) switch. It was not the game’s fault by any means. The Mirkwood expansion was excellent, and as I was a lifetime subscriber to LOTRO anyway, the switch really didn’t affect me. I just seemed to have wandered off somewhere near the beginning of Volume 3, Book 2 as the Grey Company headed south.

My return was horrible to be frank. When I logged back in I was beset on all sides by system mailings, announcements of new achievements I had somehow started, resets to all my legendary weapons, and a new trait / stat regime. It was bad enough that I was in the middle of a book, with tons of other quests already started, in the beginning of a region I didn’t remember while staring at a virtual cockpit of skills. Like a strange, albino gangle creature emerging into sunlight, I just blindly stumbled around for awhile until I found something to kill. It took me way too long to kill the enemy (as I, in the madness of things, had forgotten to up my legendary weapon’s DPS because it had been reset), and frustrated I logged off.

All I wanted was to start playing. Was that so much to ask? I didn’t want to think about all the chores I had to do. I would get to that. There was no easing back in to things. It was a sheer cliff wall of activation energy facing me. Continue reading [LOTRO] A Tale of Re-Entry

[GW2] Queued Up

A big thing right now in the ‘sphere are the SWTOR queues. Even with their staggered launch, BioWare is being hit with some hefty queues. Yet, nothing is really new. Voodoo equations prognosticating things like server health, player retention, and herd leveling speed are part of the design, and they usually seem to say “queues now are better in the long run.” One trick I loved with Rift was joining the hour-long queue a little after 7. Taking the remainder of the hour to put the kids to bed, and once they were down, voila! the queue was just about done. It really helped to just walk away. Even sitting there and reading a book or watching TV while you queue in front of your computer will likely have an effect on your mental and physical well-being.

Because the ArenaNet Community Managers are now on vacation, let’s do a little logic exercise. First, we must assume! We must assume that Guild Wars 2 will have queues. We know they are going to have servers (“worlds“) more like current MMOs than the original Guild Wars, where players get to fight for their world in World vs. World PvP combat and fight evil in their world with other worldly citizens. It’s a safe assumption given almost every MMO’s launch. Continue reading [GW2] Queued Up

[SWTOR] Story Hooks and Subscriptions

For a subscription MMO, getting hooks into players is pretty much a top priority. Players that want to return are more likely to continue to subscribe than players nearing the meh-zone. People have been pretty pleased with the launch of SWTOR so far, except for the log-in queues. Unlike Rift, which may have been a shock to the ‘sphere as far as quality went, I really haven’t seen any ‘3 month death toll’- posts at launch.  Still, the 3 month mark is one to give the MMO a hard eye.

In Rift, I was just hitting level 45 or so and getting in to the “end game.” I quit. Between my guild and the game, I still didn’t have enough hooks in my skin to keep me interested in paying. I wouldn’t necessarily call it a fault of Rift; I just think that ye ol’ gear shift from leveling to end game in Rift (modeled after other vanilla MMOs of yore) was not for me. So I was tangentially flung away from the game. I know I was not alone.

I still don’t think the core of SWTOR is different enough for me even if it is a solid MMO, but I still have to wonder what effect the story pillar will have on subscriptions. If I assume that in 3 months time that my situation would be similar to Rift, would I pay another month or two just to see the end of my story. Would I want to start another one?

Then there is the issue of BioWare’s post launch plans adding in new story content. If I were a betting man, I would say that the story pillar will definitely keep more subscribers around at the 3 month mark. Of course, there is also the feeling of finishing, which might make some players kick their feet up as credits rolls. I don’t think this will happen often. I didn’t see many instances of players doing that in Guild Wars or Lord of the Rings Online.

I know as the inevitable first wave of subscribers tampers down, the statistic I would love to see how much impact did the story pillar have on their monthly tithe. It’s something that could definitely change future MMO ideas.

–Ravious

[GW2] Mesmer Metagame

One profession in Guild Wars 2 is the direct descendant of its ancestor in the original Guild Wars. The warrior now has significant ranged weapon mastery. The elementalist became one of the most versatile on-the-fly professions. The ranger got blended with Pokemon, and the necromancer decided to turn into a plague-bearing cockroach with friends that don’t decay as fast. Nope, it’s the freshly officialized mesmer.

Oh, you say, the mesmer lost hexes and interrupts. They make copies of themselves, for Kormir’s sake. It is the most different, you say! Yet, I would say the mesmer didn’t change. It was the battleground that changed. Continue reading [GW2] Mesmer Metagame

[SWTOR] Dialogues on Rat Tails

Everybody knows about the fourth pillar that will exalt Star Wars The Old Republic (SWTOR) over all other vanilla MMO brethren: story. Except many MMOs have already had story available. They were told through many various mechanisms including good ol’ quest text, in-game actions, and even cut scenes. Plenty of MMOs even had branching effects caused by the player decisions. Most were silly in hindsight. (Did you really want to poach that innocent forest animal for the dwarf when you needed to befriend the hostile elves?)

BioWare’s games are about story, and their MMO, gosh darnit, was going to have story amplified to 11. Are these wings of words and wax enough to raise SWTOR above the crowd? Continue reading [SWTOR] Dialogues on Rat Tails

[SWTOR] Mob Action

Like I said earlier, there are two core differences to the presentation of Star Wars The Old Republic (SWTOR) from other vanilla MMOs. Fighting static NPCs is one of those differences. (The other is replacing quest text with interactable cut scenes, but I will save that for a later post.) Fighting feels less formulaic than many other vanilla MMOs, and it definitely feels higher in action even if it is still the equivalent of two spreadsheets in mortal combat. The reason is that instead of single mobs, SWTOR has encounters.

Encounters are a group of enemy NPCs (i.e., “mobs”) that are all alerted to the player’s presence if one of them is attached or alerted to the player’s ill intentions, like walking by. They all aggro, but even with a 4-on-1 fight, the heroic player wins the day. Continue reading [SWTOR] Mob Action

[GW2] Interview with ArenaNet’s Eric Flannum

“Iteration” is a word emphasized by ArenaNet. It seems something greater than mere polish, and I asked ArenaNet if they could entertain a few questions about their design and development practice. What does it really mean to iterate? Guild Wars 2 Lead Designer Eric Flannum graciously took some time to talk about the term and what it means to the studio and Guild Wars 2.

Q: ArenaNet touts “iteration” a lot in interviews and official blog posts. Is it not the industry norm to iterate during MMO development? Are other games’ leads more bullheaded and less willing to deviate from the plan? What makes ArenaNet’s iteration of Guild Wars 2 special? Continue reading [GW2] Interview with ArenaNet’s Eric Flannum