A Weekend With The Secret World

This weekend I spent a fairly extensive amount of time with The Secret World, and I have come to the conclusion that there is a pretty solid game, even if I left the weekend with as many questions as I had coming in. Many of the concepts that had me interested in the title were as good as advertised, and maybe even better than I anticipated.

I jumped into game on Friday afternoon, determined to see exactly what Funcom had created, and despite some anticipation, I have to admit there was some reservation that I was going to be wasting my time. I created my character, and popped into modern day London. While spending a few minutes exploring, I felt that London was much like other MMO's, in that it simply felt as if it was the backdrop, or setting for a story, and that it wasnt an actual, living and breathing city. When I blogged about my Guild Wars 2 weekend experience that was one of the things that really impressed me. It felt a living world with life and activities, and Arenanet got it right, just a few weeks later I was in a fairly stale, but pretty London. Cars were parked, none of them moved, I could hear sirens but could never get to them. In the Haitian Market area there was some activity, but in general NPC's were static. It wasnt until later on when both my wife and I logged in to play that I started to explore London, and we looked around looking for "Lore Cubes" that I began to enjoy London.

I had hoped that that London would be a grand city, and while it obviously cant be entirely built in a game, considering the size and scope of Tarantia in Age of Conan especially since it was another Funcom title. I had hoped for something relatively equal and was let down. Tarantia felt like it was a city, but London was a a small area, several blocks that never made it feel like a city to me. Perhaps more is unlocked later on, or perhaps Funcom will expand these areas, as I would think the opportunity to adventure in New York, London and Seoul would be something players would enjoy.

Funcom said that the tutorial in beta is different than that of the launch client, but I did the tutorial area, which is told thru an adventure in a Tokyo subway station, and you are given your first glimpse into what the game has in store for you. As far a tutorials go, it wasnt bad, and you are not given much in the way of handholding or back story. I am definitely curious how and why this would differ from that of the release version.

Upon completing the tutorial, I headed to the Templar headquarters, which was in a huge and beautiful building, with only two rooms available to explore. (To be fair, the club which was across the street was fully explorable) and got a quest to move me to Solomon Island, and Kingsmouth. At this time I was sent to try out several weapons, and choose one I wanted to start with, and I was given a basic tutorial on the Skill Wheel. Fortunately, Funcom preloads your options with 11 "decks" or builds that have a certain synergy of skills, because starting out knowing there are 500+ skills to choose from, a novice wont have the first idea where they need to begin. First time out I picked an assault rifle and moved on out.

I headed to the subway station, and was ushered into Agartha. This is Funcom's solution for quick travel, and as it happens, Agartha is a legendary city beneath the surface of the earth, which in part touches on the belief that the earth itself is hollow. There is a short cutscene explaining how it works, and then I was whisked off to Solomon Island where I felt I was done with tutorial and moving into the game itself.

To be honest, nothing had really jumped out and grabbed me at this point, and I was herded towards the town of Kingsmouth on a small chain of quests that had me killing zombies, and giving me some basic mechanics and ideas of the game. It began with kill zombies, then jump on a car with an alarm, and the alarm would go off and alert more zombies. That was followed with a quest where I would ignite a gas can and run zombies thru the blaze to set them on fire. About this point the game froze, I had to manually close it, and no matter how many times I tried to get back in over the weekend, trying to log the character in crashed the game for me.

For many people that would have been the end of things. It could have been for me as well, but I waited until that evening, and started up the game, along with the wife so we could give the game a whirl ourselves. As I mentioned earlier, for the first time I enjoyed London, as we tried to find every bit of lore that we could.

When we got to Solomon Island we progressed past where I was, and reached the town of Hellsmouth, and when that happened, my outlook on the game really started to change. A town beseiged by zombies, where many inhabitants are holed up in the police station, barricaded in isnt a new concept in gaming, but it is a different one for a MMO. We started to take quests, and explore the town and before we knew it we were both caught up in it, and we'd spent around 5 hours straight playing.  The tide had turned, and instead of being disinterested, I had become engrossed in the world around me.

We returned on Saturday and continued to explore the town, and we got absolutely caught up in the Investigation quests. In fact, these might be some of the best quests that I've ever seen in an MMO, simply because they made me think, and use outside resources to solve them. One quest began in a church, and it started outside when we were instructed to find an Illuminati symbol, which was relatively easy to do, and we followed a path of those symbols thru the town, to a plaque. Reading the plaque gave a clue, and we had to figure out what the "seat of power" was, (there was a lighthouse on the plaque, but that wasnt it.) The plaque had a name, Frans Hals and I had to look him up to find he was a Dutch Painter. We found the seat of power, and saw that the building had many, many paintings now clickable, I started clicking and "found nothing" on the first two, and on the third I found was donated by a member of the volunteer fire department, and I was instructed to go there and deterimine if that was a clue. My wife on the other hand looked at the paintings, and found one that was a Hals painting, clicked it, and got the next clue. I was stunned at the detail, I thought it would simply be random, but I had clicked too soon and had to go follow a false trail! The quest went onwards, we had to look up a bible verse, take a part of it, and use it as a code to enter a secret door, and eventually complete the quest. This quest took an hour or more, but there was a sense of satifaction upon solving it that I'm not used with MMO quests. Fortunately there were several quests of this nature, and solving each of them yielded a sense of gratification.

Our adventures continued thru the weekend, and both of us were sorry that the weekend event had concluded. In many MMO's I admit, I tend to race towards max level, soloing as much as I can in order to start the end game. For the first time in a long time, maybe ever, I was not just enjoying the ride, I was not wanting to solo. There was no joy in solving things on my own, or using the in-game web browser to hunt for clues, the game was fun because I was interacting with someone, and working with them to solve a puzzle. From what I saw, I'm not sure that I'd have an interest in soloing this MMO, or that I'd be racing to see the end-game. I have no idea what the end-game is, but I do know that there is some serious enjoyment to be had while just playing.

The Bad:

Sure, I had a good time this past weekend, but it doesnt mean that I did not find things that I did not care for with the title, and it's only fair to make mention of them.

For me, it starts with the character creator. I know Funcom says that they are going to add more choices before launch, but I've heard that song from them in the past, so I'm not going to hold my breath. The creator is as basic as I've seen in an MMO for years, and there are perhaps 40-50 combo's that you can actually have, this doesnt do much for feeling unique.

I'm not sure that combat should be listed under the bad, it is simply mediocre. The Ability Wheel may let you customize your character but some skills dont feel useful, and it is a "tab target" spamfest for the most part. Some elements feel slightly more strategic, but since the mid and out wheel were locked for beta, I have no way to mix and match beyond the inner circle. This is also an animation issue, but the short version is that this is tried and true MMO combat, with very little new with the actual combat.

While we are at at it, let's talk about The Secret World being leveless. Funcom's take on it isnt quite Ultima Online, where you earned skill by using an item.(8x8 levling anyone?) Here you earn experience in traditional MMO ways, by killing mobs, completing quests, and when you hit certain markers you earn skill points. Well in a sense, you have levels without a level number. You cant get to the outer tier of the ability wheel unless you earn so much XP. Instead of going for levels, your XP means new abilites. Skill points are much the same, and you have to have so many skill points invested in skills in order to equip talisman's (which function as armor) or weapons. In this manner you still have many trappings of levels, without having the actual number for a level. I hope Funcom doesnt think players cant figure this out.

As I discussed earlier, ArenaNet has done a far better job of creating cities, and has breathed life into the world, where The Secret World feels like any other MMO in years past where the world is just a static canvas. A few weeks ago this probably would not have bothered me, but having seen Guild Wars 2, I have to admit, the differences seem very stark.

Instancing. This past weekend all participants were on a single server. I have no idea how many people were in each instance, and Funcom did a nice job of never making me feel alone, and also did not make me feel cramped in a zone. This was reminicent of the zones in Age of Conan. I dont remember how, but we got one window asking if we wanted to shift to the same zone as groupmates, but the most common method upon logging in was to log back out, and then in.

Animations make the list as something that is just not up to par. This is another item that Funcom assures people that it will have more animations ready for release. I'm not saying it is impossible, but it seems a rather curious claim because you would anticipate they would want to show a very polished game for it's first public outing. Perhaps they will add more, but I certainly wont hold my breath.

I'm not sure how I feel about cutscenes. I admit I was spoiled in TOR that in a cutscene I was a participant by being able to respond, and I missed that here. These were far better than the story cutscenes of GW2, but there were just so many places where I was watching, and not participating. I enjoy the story if I'm participating in it, but if I'm always just watching I admit if I'm not emotionally invested then I'm tempted to space bar. That goes for the non-main story quests of Kingsmouth.

The quest limit of only 5 active quests was a major downer, especially since to restart a quest you need to go back to the original quest giver. In other games I'd take as many quests as I could in a hub and head out, here though, I was constantly faced with "pausing" a quest when I ran into a new, and unexpected quest in the world. I dont like having to choose which quest to have, it feels limiting.

The Good:

Funcom got the setting right. In some strange way this was Left for Dead mixed with Walking Dead, mixed with other strange stories you may have heard. Kingsmouth felt like Funcom wanted it to feel. A dead town, with a few pockets of life, and an undeniable fear over absolutely everything. This isnt something I'm used to in an MMO, and I liked it.

The quests. Very few quests were "one and done", most were in multiple tiers, so you had many steps to do, and it extended the quests so they felt more like part of a story. There were standard kill and escort quests, but the investigation quests were outstanding, and are simply some of the best quests that I've ever done in an MMO.

Flexability in class design. Sure, Funcom gives you templates, and they dont hold your hand, but it was day 2 for me before I added a second weapon to my hammer, and started to look at what skills for hammer and sword seemed to fit, and I honestly wish I had more time to get to know this facet of the game.

Slightly surprising me, I was able to get between 40-60 FPS in TSW while in GW2 I was gettin 25-40 FPS. Optimization is normally not a strong suit for Funcom, and while they have work to do, they arent in a bad spot right now.


Summary:

The fact that I started with the bad, and listed more bad that good would usually be taken as a sign that either I did not care for the game, or that I'm not all that interested in the game. In this case, the good actually outweighs the bad, as I feel that strongly about it. If I was rating the game today, it would get a fairly strong 6 or 6.5 out of 10, but there are a few elements that I still dont have information about that will determine if I'd move that number up my chart.

With only one faction playable there was no access to either instanced PvP or the 3-faction world style PvP that Funcom has talked about. If you go back to an earlier blog I did, on what is important to me in an MMO you'll see that meaningful world PvP and instanced PvP top my list. With no experience in The Secret World, I have no way of knowing what to expect, and for a game to be a long term success for me, that's something pretty important.

There are no public quests, but as I alluded to earlier, I feel more desire to play this game with friends than alone so I dont miss the public quests quite as much as I'd expect. In addition, the zone wide chat system in TSW showed me that Funcom got chat right, especially compared to ArenaNet's inexplicable failure to include any kind of zone wide chat.

I have definite concerns about the amount of content available in TSW as well as replayability. It would appear there is a very linear path thru TSW, and I'm still not sure how much your faction will play a part of your story. If in fact your faction plays a middling part to your questing, then I dont see a reason to experience more than one faction. Perhaps it does play a bigger part, but again, not enough information to judge at this time.

TSW appears to have a total of 9 PvE zones, and Funcom doesnt have a reputation for churning out content rapidly, so I do worry that once you complete the 9 zones, all you will be left with is PvP. While I dont have a huge issue with that, I am bothered that I'll be left with something I still havent seen. Solving the investigation quests is tremendously fun, but once solved they can easily be repeated, and lose a huge sense of satisfaction. This is one reason I asked myself if this game, and this story could have been better told as a single player RPG or a co-op style game? I'm not one to judge the path that Funcom has taken, but there is no doubt in my mind that this is a very heavily content driven game. There are hundreds of thousands of myths and legends that could be explored, and that might fit the title, but can Funcom address that in a timely manner?

Inevitably the question is going to be asked, about which I like better TSW or GW2. The honest answer is that I like GW2 right now, because I've had a chance to experience the PvP. I love the setting for TSW. Each game has some distinct positives and some things that I dont care for. GW2 is likely going to be the commercial success, and TSW is going to find an audience that wants different concepts, even if those concepts are trapped in a fairly traditional MMO formula. There is just enough of Funcom's particular take for me, but I know that wont be the case for everyone.

On the whole, I like what I see, I'd consider picking the title up, right now my hunch is that it might only be worth a few months of entertainment, and I'd like to be able to get more from an MMO, but this is a truly enjoyable world, with a great concept. I have definite concerns about the end-game, what it is, and how engaging it will be. This isnt going to garner millions of subscriptions, and Blizzard doesnt have to worry about it eroding Warcrafts sub base. This is definitely a niche MMO, and one where you will have to turn your brain on, and think if you want to solve quests on your own. Sure, within weeks there will be sites will all the answers, but if you enjoy figuring out puzzles on your own, and you want to excercise your brain instead of your coordination with a jumping puzzle, TSW is probably a game to keep on your radar. I know it's going to be on mine.

Secret World Intrigues Me

Funcom is rolling out a Beta Weekend Event this coming weekend, and you can get keys from Gamespot. With my time investment in The Old Republic for years now, TSW is a title that I've kept a loose eye on from afar. From the get-go, I've enjoyed some of their concepts and ideas, and I've always felt that Ragnar Tornquist has done some great work on past games, like The Longest Journey. The problem of course is that it is Funcom, and I was there for the launches of both Anarchy Online, and Age of Conan, the latter of which I was a big fan of pre-release, again based on game concepts more than the actual game.

For those of you that dont know anything about it, The Secret World is a MMO set in a modern universe. The basic premise is simply "what if stories, legends and myths are true?" What if there is another world, a hidden world from most people, what if legends of ghost ships, vampires, mummies, zombies and other creatures exists. Players are awakened to this reality, and based on their choices are introduced into one of three secret societies, the Templars, the Illuminati, or the Dragons, all of whom fight these evils and advance their own interests in many ways.

Right there, I'm drawn in, the idea of conspiricies and myths being true, and a modern setting go a long way for me, it isnt elves, dwarves and orc's. There are no lightsabers, but a game based in the modern world, that's just a setting that I've never really seen done all that well. I'm going to explore our globe, and go from Stonehenge to Egpyt. There are puzzles, they have even suggested you'll need a web browser to search for certain myths so you can either solve quests, or understand some of the background for others. Those are some concepts I remember reading about, and I dont know if they are still part of the game, but I am anxious to see.

Most MMO's have levels and are class based, but TSW isnt. There are no levels, instead you accumulate skill points, and buy skills, and there are over 500 skills to choose from. Seven skills are active, seven are passive, so you can build a character that suits your playstyle, and you can switch on the fly if you need to fill a different role in a group. TSW still doesnt break away from the trinity based combat system of past MMO's, but because of what it does offer, I've got to say I may not mind too much.

There is three faction PvP, something many of us have screamed for since Dark Age of Camelot. I dont know how it will compare to that of Guild Wars 2, and I dont know if it is single server, but if in fact it is, for many folks I think it would be a massive selling point. GW2 is getting plenty of hype for being a spiritual successor to DAoC style PvP, but if TSW does the same thing, and does it on a single sever, that's a solution that appeals to me more than GW2. That being said, TSW has a lot to show me in terms of that PvP, because the keep defend/capture mechanic of GW2 is indeed stellar, and perhaps the largest single reason I will play it.


So enough about the game itself. Granted I havent followed the game avidly, I see a lot of things about it that I'm intersted in, at least interested enough to want to check out. I know it's Funcom, I fully expect a fairly linear world, I expect a fairly rough launch, and I'm not terribly thrilled that it is subcription based plus cash shop, that seems a bit excessive. I thought Funcom had major issues at launch trying to balance classes in Age of Conan, I wonder how they will balance 500+ skills in a classless game. I think that eventually we'll see people figure out a few builds that work, and eventually people will jump into them. I expect there to be gaps in content, and I question how fast they will be able to pump out new content.

I watched the video I linked the other day when I wanted to see where the game stands today, and I'd rather see a GDC presentation than some random trailer, or "fly-by". I really, truly, am impressed by the concepts that Funcom wants to try. I have no illusions that this title is going to be a mass market monster, it isnt, but I get the feeling that it has very strong niche potential, and could very well do as well as Rift did last year. I wont say that Rift came from nowhere to turn in a fairly respectable year, but it wasnt a big "name" title. Perhaps some of the success is due to the fact that we havent had a desireable MMO release in years, and for what Rift offered it was fairly polished (even if I hated the PvP). The bottom line is that it was a below the radar success story.

Funcom has some tougher competition, as dollars are still invested in TOR for some people, Guild Wars 2 on the near horizon (even if it is not a subscription game) Tera, and the Pandalicious World of Warcraft expansion. Personally I have never subscribed to two MMO's at the same time, I did have a couple of SWG accounts, but that was the same title. In my last blog I detailed a bit about why I'm about ready to say my farewell to The Old Republic for now, but for the first time, I would actually consider buying and subscribing to The Secret World as well as playing Guild Wars 2.

I'm looking forward to this beta weekend to see how the concepts I enjoy actually play out, and what kind of a game TSW is really shaping up to be. I have to look twice at anything that Funcom does, and that does make me a bit more skeptical. While I dont know that TSW could hold my attention for years at a time, I do wonder if there is enough for 5-6 months of enjoyment. I'll post my impressions of the experience early next week.

SWTOR Where have you gone?

On the first day of early access in SWTOR, I took a screenshot when I reached Imperial Fleet, I found it amusing that I was one of 5 people there on fleet. I made a few comments in guild chat, to the effect that it would probably be the last time ever we'd see single digits on fleet, and how a screenshot would be nice. By the time I got the shot, there were up to 9, and I hurried to get the shot. The reason I laugh now, is that when I logged in yesterday I had a moment where there were single digit people on Republic Fleet. Almost back to where I was during early access, except then the population was growing quickly, and now the population has gone.

I've been a huge fan of SWTOR since it was announced, I spent countless hours on guild, game, and fan site forums discussing the game. I took a vacation to Boston in 2011 and brought the family to spend a couple of days at PAX East and see the SWTOR booth, and no I did not drag 'em kicking and screaming, they went willingly, my daughter being a massive Star Wars fan. I'm sharing all of this to give you an idea of how big a fan I have been of TOR. Despite being a fan, I can be honest with myself, and admit that TOR did do quite a few things wrong, or poorly, but it also did a few things right. Both of those topic's will be forthcoming blogs, but for now let's just go with the idea that I can admit when something is both good, and bad.

So where am I going with all this? Well, I've finally hit a wall, where to an extent I feel that I've about checked out of the game. It isnt the game itself, because SWTOR was, I feel, pretty much exactly what I anticipated it being. It was a story driven MMO, and having seven characters above level 20, and five at level 50 I've thoroughly enjoyed the stories that were provided. Above and beyond, I was let down at the Illum World PvP, but on the whole, good points and bad, I've had a very positive experience, until now.

I realize that offering character transfers or merging servers is considered a sign of declining subs, and that usually hurts a title, so that we rarely see them this soon after release. However, the fact that it is now nearly impossible to find groups, and there are so few servers with an active population I think Bioware needs to act, deal with the bad publicity, and save some subcribers. Post launch, I belonged to a guild that had around 90 members on the Sith side, and around as many on the Republic side, with 25-40 players in each faction online during prime times. In addition, on the Sith side we had an allied guild populated with more of my close friends that most nights had 10-15 players online.

Within a few weeks after release, we had many activities, from PvP nights, to raids, as well as instance runs, but as would be expected, over time, and like the game itself, we had members leaving and moving on, and while I still have a few friends who casually play, I'm almost in awe of how far active players have fallen. My wife, who has enjoyed the game, hit level 50 on her first character about 3 weeks ago, and since then, we have not been able to put together a single hard mode instance run so she could experience what that would be like. Here's where it gets bad, on several occasions, we had 3 people, meaning we needed one single other player to go with, and were unable to find someone. Myself, with the variety of 50's I have, I could have tanked, DPS'd, and the other person was a healer, so it wasnt like we were looking for a specific class or role, we simply needed one other human being to go with. Granted we were not trying every single night, but the fact that we failed to find a 4th person on no less than 6 nights over three weeks was a very frustrating experience.

When I came to The Old Republic, I came with a large group of friends, and made many more. I made a couple of friends that now I'd hate to play an MMO and not have them there to share the experience with. Today, I cant find people to do things with. What I find amusing is the criticism that TOR is simply a single player RPG with MMO trappings. Honestly, nothing could be further from the truth, if that was accurate then I'd still be playing. The game would essentially end when you hit level 50, but without other players, I find myself trapped and unable to experience the end-game, and am limited to doing nothing but leveling characters. When I hear that particular criticism I think people want to find a reason to dislike the game, and forget how solo friendly many, if not most other MMO's are today.

I had someone suggest that if I like the game so much, why not re-roll on another server? The answer for me at least, is simply investment. I have millions of credits, I have 5 level 50's, so I dont want to re-do stories again and again. My wife took months to hit level 50, and I'd like to play with her, is it fair to ask to spend another 4 months leveling a toon? Asking my few friends left who play to move and start again sounds absurd as well.

Once upon a time, I'd hoped that I'd be playing The Old Republic for year long stretches, but today I dont see that as realistic, and it is a shame. I have until mid-June on my subscription, and my logging in between now and then is made harder because I feel less invested knowing that I'm done then. How many times I choose to login between now and then is based more on hoping to see some friends, or take "last runs" thru certain areas. If there were people on my server, The Old Republic could be more than a niche game for me. It's niche because all I have left is to experience a few class stories, and I'm not sure that's enough.

Bioware, you need to make some hard choices, you have fans who want to spend money. It's obvious now that TOR will never be a runaway hit, but if it drives away subscribers by keeping us spread out among far too many servers it will hurt even worse. I've had a passing interest in The Secret World for quite some time, but I never signed up for beta, and never got too involved thinking that I would be too tied up in TOR. This weekend, I'm going to try the weekend beta event they are running, as I tried the GW2 beta a few weekends ago. If TOR isnt going to allow me to play the way I want to play, then I'll take my dollars onto another niche game, until I find something that can be more than niche for me.

The Elder Scrolls Online

For those that missed it, this past week Zenimax Online, the parent of Bethesda Softworks announced that they were bringing the popular Elder Scrolls to the MMO audience. Elder Scrolls has long been a popular single player RPG, and has a massive following, so one might suspect that this announcement would be greated with cheers so players could explore the world with friends, instead the announcement has been met with derision, and has many fans of both The Elder Scrolls and MMO's up in arms. I'm tempted to say that this is the worst reception to an announcement of a "beloved" IP that I've ever seen, and I think it is happening for a couple of reasons.

In addition to the announcement, there was info on a leaked article in the June issue of Game Informer. Knowing how beloved the IP is, the fact that Matt Firor, the Dark Age of Camelot Producer is at the helm, and promises a three faction game that many disenfranchised fans seem to want, where have things gone wrong?


Loss of identity

I think it all starts with a loss of identity. Fans of The Elder Scrolls enjoy the series deliver a fairly open sandbox for you to play in. Going back in time, to where I was introduced to the series, Daggerfall, boasted an impressive 487,000 sq km to explore, which is nearly twice the size of Great Britian, and this was merely two provinces of Tamriel. Daggerfall had 15,000 towns, villages and dungeons for a player to visit along with 750,000 NPC's. Those are impressive numbers, even if they were randomly generated. Putting it in perspective, Oblivion had a mere 41.4 sq km to explore. Daggerfall is available for a free download and granted it is a 16 year old DOS game, it is a true classic, especially for those of us who want worlds to explore.

The Elder Scrolls has deep roots in giving players a huge sandbox where your main quest may be directed, but you are encouraged to go off the beaten path and explore the world and everything that there is to do in the world. First person combat, a political and guild system, the ability to buy property, and act as you wish. Dont like the person across the street? Shoot him in the ear with an arrow, but reap the consequences if you are seen. Where a developer like Bioware usually gives a story to experience, Bethesda gives players a place to create their own story. Imagine Bioware doing Call of Duty, and understand why fans feel that Zenimax is taking the IP in a different direction.

So where is all of this going? Well, in the leaked article, Zenimax appears to be developing a game that lacks many of the traits that made The Elder Scrolls successful and popular. It will be a class based game, with a fairly traditional leveling system, no housing and generally is giving the feeling of another re-skinned themepark experience, which are available by the boat load today. The only difference is that it is taking place in the world of Tamriel.

Where were you in 2008?

The second part of the equation, as I see it, is the World of Warcraft effect. Back in November of 2008, they announced that they had 11.5 million subscribers, and were the benchmark game in the industry. The model that every developer wanted to meet and exceed was the one that WoW had earned. For a general frame of reference, most AAA MMO's seem to take between 4-6 years of development, so to understand what TES is announcing today, we need to go back 4 years to understand why they set out to make what they did.

I think it is fairly obvious that WoW was the 300lb gorilla, and games like SWTOR, Rift, and TES were heavily influenced by that model. Granted each of them may be trying to put a unique stamp on their game, and on the genre, story, dynamic events, return of 3-faction PvP, but they have all failed to accurately perceive the changing tastes of the genre's fanbase thru their crystal balls. While the first two titles met with initial box sale success, they have failed to dethrone the heavy weight, and have had their own issues with jaded fans, especially when compared to a game that has been around for 7+ years and has 7+ years of development and content available.

These days games like The Secret World and Guild Wars 2 are both trying to break away from some typical conventions of the genre, but having spent some time in GW2, I realize that there are only so many ways you can hide a quest to go kill 10 spiders. Dont get me wrong I like GW2 quite a bit, but it doesnt completely break the chains and doesnt offer a completely new experience. I have not seen TSW, but my hunch is that it'll give some new takes on current ideas, but wont be an entirely new experience either.

Really, TES should bring back a true 3-faction PvP game and do it in the world of Tamriel, which is enough for someone like me, but I hazzard a guess that people will be even more burnt out, and more jaded, and you can see it in the reception TES is getting today. People do want something different, they want games to break ground, or at least stay true to their roots. The problem is that game development cycles are not short, and when Blizzard was boasting yearly about how many new subscriptions they were earning, it was far easier for developers to push a tried a true path for their own titles.  With Blizzard admitting that they have seen a subscriber decrease in the past year or so, it may not be until 2014 or 2015 when we start to see the impact on titles in development.

I geuninely believe that many titles in late development now are going to leave people feeling disappointed because they cannot and will not entirely break the current WoW inspired MMO formula. I can only hope that in a few years we'll start to see more companies willing to take some chances and go in new directions.

GW2 Beta Weekend Event Impressions

Guild Wars 2 is not the messiah of the MMO genre, at least based on my experience this past weekend, but it is an extremely fun game, and sometimes, that's enough. I figure we should start by saying that, especially with all the hype the title has received. It's strange, looking back on some of my notes, on Friday night I was impressed by a few things, but generally felt a "meh" attitude towards the game. On Saturday I was struggling with the combat dismayed by the poor performance (yes, I know it was beta, and the client was not optimized, but it was hard not to pay attention to the performance) and Sunday morning it was like everything finally came together and fell in place and I was enjoying myself, wishing that the beta was not going to end. I think part of it was the culmination of all the little things that were "right" about the title, and the other part was finally getting a handle on the combat system which coming from traditional MMO's felt alien to me on Friday.

I started off rolling a human Thief, and jumped right into the mix, staying in the tutorial area a little bit longer than most people just so I could try to wrap my head around the combat system, and wanting to unlock some of my skills and understand them. Once I did that, I wrapped up the tutorial area, and followed the herd of players out into the world, and where I started experiencing mixed emotions. If you have ever done a beta event, or jumped into an MMO at launch you'll know what I mean, where there are 3,000 people right where you are, and everything feels crazy. I was blown away by how good the game itself looked. I'm not talking Age of Conan type of detail, it was like moving around in a painting. I cannot stress how good things looked, but my appreciation was muted as I ran towards the first "heart" I saw on the map, wanting to experience what questing was like. Try an imagine what seemed to be hundreds of people all trying to do the exact same thing, in addition to a slide show experience it was a struggle to do anything, mobs died incredibly quick, before most people could even attack. Even knowing what to expect, it did make it a little bit harder to enjoy what I was doing. 

After a little adventuring, I decided to escape the masses and head off for some PvP. I did several structured PvP maps to wrap my head around my boosted to level 80 toon, and had mixed results. I felt that melee was at a distinct disadvantage to ranged, and since I was not level 7, I had not unlocked the ability to swap weapons. At about this time I decided to jump into WvWvW PvP and it was there that the game started to click for me. I wont say that it was a drop in of Warhammer RvR PvP, but it did remind me of it in many ways. I had a level of familiarity with it, what to do, and how to do it. Darkhaven was a day 1 monster, and we had several small bands grabbing just about everything on the map, and it was fun. That night I rolled out a second toon, a ranger with my wife and we had a chance to do the starting areas with people more spread out, and I had another "click" with the game, and was enjoying it.

Without too much detail, I got into crafting on Saturday and found a system that I really enjoyed, I died a lot in PvE and PvP, but I found that I was starting to understand the combat system, and how to attack, dodge and stay alive, and slowly I was starting to enjoy the combat. By Sunday evening, I felt I had the combat system down, I'd done a ton of exploring, I ventured back to instanced PvP, and was cutting thru casters like a hot knife thru butter and feeling very good indeed about the game.

So let's talk more about some of the good, the little things, and some of the bad, because there are definitely a few issues I have with the game as it stands.

The Good:

ArenaNet got cities and music down perfectly, and they got them so right that I cant think of another MMO that has done it as well. Divinity's Reach had NPC's all over the place, and not just standing still, but moving around, engaging in conversations with each other, from the obvious wealthy areas to the slumbs, from the circus to crafting areas, the atmosphere felt hand crafted. Many doors were open, and you could go into bar's, and inn's, explore buildings and halls. This was absolutely a masterpiece, and I'd suggest anyone who wants to see an example of a great MMO city should visit for that reason alone.


Questing tends to make the game feel like a more directed themepark. Instead of hub to hub, players open their map, see which hearts are not filled, and then go off to do them. This isnt a bad thing, and it gave me reason to run all over, but it is a very directed experience. Most of these are located off main roads, so you do have a reason to go cross country, and it made a world of difference.

Underwater combat was novel, and I did spend a fair amount of time in the WvWvW area swimming around, and found several underwater entry points to keeps. It made me smile, and I know it may not happen often, but I can tell you now the first underwater assault on a keep I take part in will immediately set the WvWvW apart from other MMO's.

If I had written this on Friday, combat may have gone into the bad column, thankfully I took some time and learned it. One might think that only having 5 skills means shallow combat, and button mashing, and that's probably what I did early on, and it got me killed more often than not. With weapon swap at level 7, I was constantly trying to find which pairings worked well together, was it two pistols with two daggers? Pistol main hand and dagger offhand? Sword main hand and pistol offhand? When I finally found what worked for me, and I was dodging, combat felt good. This is, I think, the single biggest bridge for traditional MMO fans to adapt to, as combat almost played more like a hack and slash RPG. That isnt a great comparisson, but it's about as good as I can find. It'll take time for people to adapt, if they stick with it, there is definitely a reward.

Crafting is exactly what I'm looking for. Star Wars: The Old Republic took too much away from players letting companions do all the work, and Vanguard originally was too big a time sink (8 hours to gather materials and craft a small ship.) Nothing has ever equalled Star Wars: Galaxies crafting, but for where I am today as a gamer, GW2 does it right. I enjoyed gathering materials, the ability to craft granted recipe's, and the chance to randomly pull materials into the bench and see if I could discover a recipe. I'm sure that within weeks of launch websites will have all that info up for people to find, but it doesnt change the fact it exists in-game.

Despite my tearing apart some casters last night, I still believe that ranged has an easier go of things in PvP than a melee character. Part of my success was, if you are familiar with the map, around the Henge in Nifhel Forest, where I was able to line of sight casters and essentially force them to come closer to me.  All games will have imbalance, and I expect that, and most games it feels that ranged is better off than melee, so we'll have to see how this plays out.

Both instanced maps were fun, but I'd like to see more variety. The WvWvW area was a blast, and this early on it felt often like it was a zerg fest, but that's the same mentality I'd seen in other MMO's because it is the path of least resistance. Good leaders end up emerging, and you end up doing more with less people. I get the feeling I'll be spending serious time here, as it is the experience I've wanted in an MMO since Dark Age of Camelot, and to a lesser extent Warhammer Online.


I almost forgot to add how much I like the Auction House. Being able to list items while adventuring was great. I enjoyed being able to search by item, see what and how many of a certain item was available, and to set my own price that I wanted to buy an item at. After SW:TOR which has a horrid interface for the Auction House, I was blown away here by what I could do. Granted this isnt a make it or break it type feature in a game, but it is a convenience that is noteworthy and deserves mention.

The Bad:

I'm going to start with what I feel is an obvious one. The chat system is pure garbage, and it definitely has an impact on the community. For some reason the /local chat does not cover the entire zone, rather it covers in what other MMO's might be a /yell area. As an example, while I was at the front gate of Divinity's Reach I had conversations popping up that my wife did not see while she was at the crafting stations, a mere 10-15 second run from where I was. One of the common themes I saw was that people felt the game and the servers were "quiet". Apologists suggest that it is because people were too busy to be chatting, bull excrement. I've never been a part of game where chat wasnt fairly lively, even during a short beta. There are almost always people talking, asking questions, or being obnoxious. How on earth could ArenaNet build a city that feels alive and vibrant not have a chat channel that extends a zone? It's a social game. I'm not asking for server wide chat, but simple zone wide chat would make a world of difference.

The personal story. The hideous cut scenes, and yes SW:TOR spoiled me, and voice overs actually made me realize how good Bioware was at telling a story. I had a barely clothed NPC who appeared to be very young voiced as if she was in her 80's. This was a recurring theme, and it just made me wish that ArenaNet at least had an appropriate voice for the NPC.  Yes this is a step up from standard text quests, but it felt off, with a distinct lack of depth. I guess it's bad when you compare it to SW:TOR, and that might still be good enough to make it the 2nd best offering out there now, even despite the Final Fantasy-esque 1998 style cutscenes.

The instances. Again, apologists say that the only instances are for your personal story, and that is simply bull excrement. Being honest about it, overflow areas are, in fact, instances. It's the same technique used in Everquest 2, where for example Antonica fills up the game creates "Antonica 2" and people who zone in go to Antonica 2. I dont have any problem with this system when there is a way to shift instances to be in the same place as a groupmate. GW2 lacks that, and Saturday night I spent close to 20 minutes trying to get into the same overflow area as the person I was grouped with, it was a troubling experience. We could be next to each other in Divinity's Reach, and head out and we'd be in different overflow areas. Very simply overflow areas ARE instances, just not personal instances. I dont know how big a problem this is for times other than launch, but not having a way to join a groupmate is just plain stupid. Likely this takes care of itself, but add a mechanic to be in the same overflow instance as people you are grouped with.

Having to queue for WvWvW PvP. Take a step back, read that again, and think about what I'm saying. On both Saturday night and Sunday night I had to queue up for WORLD PvP. I understand there are cap limits, and I wonder if it is a total number or you are limited to a certain number of people per side, but it was a strangely frustrating experience to think that I had to queue up for instanced world PvP. Nature of the beast, but I do hope eventually ArenaNet can eliminate the cap for this area.

Summary:

I dont know if I'll spend a lot of time in future beta weekend events, simply because I am 100% confident that I'll be picking this title up and enjoying it when it releases. The items I singled out as being "bad" arent dealbreakers, and they arent horrid, but when you compare the polish of the rest of the game, they really do stand out. Granted ArenaNet has some polish and optimization work to do, but this game should release very well, and I did appreciate how ArenaNet addressed (lack of communication though) early login and network errors, which seemed nearly eliminated by Sunday.

This is a good looking, very enjoyable game. When I started the weekend I thought it was a bastard hybrid of Rift and Warhammer Online, at least in many concepts, but that would be doing it an injustice because it is so much more. I want to see some dungeons, and find out how they work, and how enjoyable they are, and despite the ArenaNet claim that endgame begins at level 1, I wonder where the staying power for me will be at level 80 beyond the WvWvW area. While PvP can extend a game because it is essentially player created content, I'm not sure where the PvE content will be, and if it will compare to the traditional MMO-esque grind experience of raiding and gearing.

Those questions however I dont think I can answer for myself until I hit level 80, and since this is a no subscription game, I wont have any problem enjoying the ride to 80 and experiencing for myself. No, this isnt the messiah of MMO's that some folks thought, but the bottom line for me is that I liked it quite a bit. We'll see where it's spot in the Pantheon of great MMO's ultimately will be, but hands down one of the better MMO's that I've experienced in quite a long time.

ArenaNet surprises me again

Just a short note, but I found something, again, about Guild Wars 2 that I had to really like. In a news blog ArenaNet discussed choosing a home world (server) and transfers. The basic part is that once you pick a world all your characters will be on that particular world. You will have an option to move home worlds once a week for a cost of 1,800 gems. Now I'm going to assume that is a cash shop item (there is another topic for another day.) and that it moves all your characters. I'm used to World of Warcraft charging $25 per character to move, which frankly felt fairly ridiculous. I'm frustrated with Bioware because server merges and character transfers are not a priority at this time, and I'm stuck on a low populated world. Again, no idea how much 1,800 gems would cost, but I'm sure it would be significantly less than what I would pay in other games. Putting this in perspective, I have five level 50's in SWTOR, and if they charged $25 per move, I'm looking at $125 to just move my 50's, and I have plenty of other toons with signifcant time invested. At that price, it's easier for me to go play another game, or re-roll on another server and be extremely angry at Bioware.

If you look at the news blog, it introduced me to the concept of "guesting". Short version is that you may have a friend that plays on a different server but you can still play with them on their server, or vice versa with some restrictions. Obviously WvWvW PvP is something that you wont be able to share, and I wonder about dungeons, but if I can still go do things with friends on a different server, then I dont have to try to get every group of people I want to play with all in the same place. I cannot express how good I think this feature is.

I am amused that the more I dig and the more I find, the more impressed I am with ArenaNet. Some of these things are very simple customer service issues, as well as easy of playability and enjoyment for customers. Their approach however isnt the same as other developers, and part of me feels that other companines should be asking: "Why arent we doing it this way?". Maybe it is game engine, or game design, I dont know, but my point is simply that ArenaNet is just trying to push the envelope in one area, they are doing it in an awful lot of areas, and that alone is probably a reason why consumers are standing up and taking notice.

Preparing to meet the messiah of MMO's

I've spent too many years in pre-launch MMO communities to not have a feel for the usual hustle, bustle and feeling of how those communites operate. Pre launch communities usually have three groups of people that inhabit both official forums and forums on fansite, and industry websites. You have fans who have already "bought in" to the game for whatever reason, and they are on board with the information you are getting. These are generally the largest group, hence being fans. The second largest contingent are people who dont like anything about the title for whatever their reasons may actually be. I'm not convinced that most of the reasons are valid, but there is generally a healthy sense of antagonsim between these two camps, and debate ensues over pretty much ever morsel of information. The third, and far smallest group are the folks who are trying to decide for themselves if they like what they are hearing, and how it applies to them. They dont have money on the fight, they are just observers.

Guild Wars 2 is perhaps the first time I've seen a different spread of the community. For perhaps the first time ever, I'm seeing about 80% of people falling into the fan column, and a good portion of them are willing to pontificate that this game is the 2nd coming, and the savior of the genre. Dont believe me? Check out the article from PC Gamer. ArenaNet has promised to do something different, and after years of games that want to resemble World of Warcraft (they may want the earnings of WoW, but nobody has come close to equaling that success in any way imaginable) this seems to be striking a powerful chord to disenchanted MMO'ers. Of our other two groups, the second largest is the people who are trying to be objective and understand how their gaming experience is impacted by what GW2 is offering. Shockingly, the smallest contingent is the "haters." Usually haters cant be shouted down by fans as there are too many, but in this case they are just so overwhelmed as to barely be heard. I'm not sure that is a good thing, but it is a surprising thing, so people with so diverse opinions on most topics have finally found something that they agree upon.

Personally, I was in the SWTOR camp for years so I did not pay a lot of attention to the hyperbole about GW2, because I was convinced that most of it was exactly that, hype. "You cant change a world, at least not for more than 10 minutes," and so on is how I felt. With my recent step back from SWTOR, and putting together my list of things that really matter to me in an MMO, I was able to take a step back and look at a game that isnt that far from launch (and to me that means within the next 4 months) and see what it had to offer, without being caught up in years worth of hype.

Fortunately for me, ArenaNet had recent put on a fairly large press beta event which gave a lot of coverage of the game both in print, and video which gave me a recent plethora of source material to draw upon. I immediately went to check out TotbalBiscuit, my favorite Cynical Brit to see what he felt about the game, and what kind of experiences he had. As usual, I found a number of video's on a wide ranging subject matter, from character classes to PvP, to jumping puzzles, but in typical Brit fashion, I found his summary of impression video to be an honest compendium of what he both liked, and disliked about the game.

I also spent some time seeing what Gamebreaker.tv's MikeB, aka Fony had to say about the game. Mike's commentary is sometimes a little over the top, I was definitely impressed by his little series of Captial City tours, and a tour he did of one of the WvWvW PvP areas. This was a 25 minute video that definitely impressed me.

With a little bit of background, I knew enough that I was intrigued, and wanted to find out more, so I made the commitment, pre-purchased the game (figuring I could always go back to Gamestop and get a refund if I did not like the weekend event, and that may not be accurate) and decided that when a weekend event came up I wanted to be a part of it. With that in mind, I started watching other video's on classes, started reading more about the game, and I noticed that more and more of the hype was being driven by people who played the game, in fact I found far less negative impressions or experiences than I had from just about any other MMO to date.

While all of these are good signs, I'm not about to make up my mind after a weekend, but there is definitely enough here for me to want to take a deeper look, and see exactly what GW2 has to offer me. That's actually what matters, not what ten reviewers, or 13,000 fans find interesting, but what is going to be interesting to me, and what will engage me. I have some long term concerns with a perceived lack of end-game material, yes I have loved raids for years, so will impromptu public events be enough for me? I dont know. Part of what I love in PvP is the community, I like seeing names I know, there is often a healthy respect formed there and World versus World versus World means I'm fighting nameless, faceless foes, people who I just dont care about beating, so there isnt that little extra something from knowing I beat someone I know is tough. Yes combat is different than what I'm used to, and there is a lot for me to experience, but I do actually want to see how I feel about those things.

I guess more than anything, I'm interested to spend a little bit of time forming my own impressions, and drawing my own conclusions. It isnt often you get to meet someone who most people identify as a messiah, and while I'm going to look at it with my own jaded eye, I have to admit, I've liked what I've seen so far enough to make the dollar commitment. I'm not looking to expose the messiah, or to like him just because someone else tells me that I should, I just want to see for myself what he's all about. We'll see after the weekend how I feel.

Beyond The Old Republic

I've spent 5 months playing Star Wars: The Old Republic and with 5 level 50's, multiple raids done, a character who is a battlemaster, I'm finally at a crossroads with the game. Dont misunderstand me, the game is pretty much exactly what I thought it would be, so I'm not suggesting Bioware did something wrong. (They did, but that's a long post for another day.) I am suggesting that the low population server that I happen to play on convinced me to sit down and examine what really matters to me in an MMO. SWTOR sold me on both story, and IP, but it turns out, there are other things that actually matter more to me, and if my choice to to find a game that has those things, or to continue to play a game with a declining population that prevents me from doing things that I'd like to do, then just maybe it's time for me to stop, and take a look around.

1) Meaningful World PvP:

Nobody did this better than Dark Age of Camelot, and to a lesser extent Warhammer Online. My personal definition of meaningful, which I realize is open to debate, is World PvP that has a tangible impact on the world, or the gameplay. I loved the Tarren Mill versus Southshore PvP in World of Warcraft as much as anyone, but ultimately winning or losing was determined by who left last, there was no lasting impact on the game world. Games like DAoC and WHO had reasons to world PvP, capturing keeps, turning a zone. It isnt a permanent impact, but it is a short term impact, and you do notice it.

Above and beyond what I've already said, meaningful world PvP is largely player created content. Think about that for a second. Look at all the things that can impact it, from class balance to class nerfs, from server population to player skill. It's players who are determining what is happen in given zones. This is content that developers dont have to create, and dont have to worry about players out leveling. Meaningful world PvP is a sandbox element that fits into most games, gives players something to enjoy, and is ongoing content that developers dont have to invest countless hours into building.

Gordon Walton who worked on titles like UO:Renissance, SWTOR, and Star Wars Galaxies gave a speech at GDC Austin in 2007 where he talked about the lessons people should learn building MMO's in a post World of Warcraft environment. One of the things he said that stuck, is that "Content sucks. Content takes people to build." I take that to mean that people eat up content faster than developers can create it. Taking that to the next step, meaningful world PvP is content that changes daily, and its a system that players build content. I'm a little amazed he is the one who said that, and was involved with SWTOR which is clearly a PvE content driven title.

Gordon Walton 2007 GDC Speech, coverage by Gamastura


2) Instanced PvP:

Yes, I like instanced PvP as well as world PvP, in fact I like most types of PvP with the exception of Arena PvP, but that too is a whole 'nother blog. Back in the mid 90's, I enjoyed FPS games, and I do today as well. The difference between the two experiences is that I'm now 38 years old, and there are 13 year olds who have reflexes on a different level than I do. Back then I would be all over a leaderboard, these days it's a fight every single game I play to break even. MMO's to me, havent been about just reflexes, they are about knowing not only your class, but knowing your opponents class as well. Sure, being quick is great, but I can combat some of that reflex loss with savvy, smarts, and skill. That's a big reason I enjoy instanced PvP as well, more outlets to test myself and compete with other people is content that doesnt have an endpoint.


3) Public Quests:

Warhammer Online was my first real exposure to public quests as a form of content. Sure, other games had small events, but Warhammer  presented it so multiple people could come participate, group, and win rewards somewhat loosely based on contribution. Rift took it a step further and polished the idea, and now Guild Wars 2 is selling it as the main offering to it's PvE.

I think only a fool believes that the results really change the game world. Guild Wars is saying that depending on what happens the path can go "up" or "down", and different things will happen until the tide is stopped and the players overcome, or dont. Here's the catch, overcome or dont, eventually, that is going to reset back to neutral and start all over again. In fact, I saw some people saying that in Guild Wars 2 beta the event was re-setting so often it was like it had never been stopped at all.

Granted GW2 is in beta, and they are tuning it, and that there is a fine line between having events often enough so people can do them (is it fair to make someone wait an hour after one ends to see it start again? What is the right balance?) but they seem to have the right idea.

Game worlds should be part of the experience, not just a setting to tell a story. Having some kind of public quests that makes me care, or gets me involved makes me experience the world in a different way.

4) Punishment:

This is pretty simple, dont do it.

There are all kinds of punishment in MMO's, from looting to death penalties, with massive time sinks and grinds in the middle. Look, I dont mind a certain amount of grinding, but when it's excessive then I've got an issue. Back when I was 20 odd years old, I could invest more time, so I cared far less, but at 38, with a job, a wife, a daughter, and other events in my life, I just dont have the time, or effort to sink untold hours for a reward. Here's the catch, if the reward is something I want, I have less objections to my time being spent. Developers beware, and find the optimum balance.

I know there are fans of full loot in PvP. I'll say it this way, I did it years ago in UO, and I know what losing everything felt like. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt, and guess what? I outgrew it. Dont get me wrong, if someone likes it, more power to 'em, but its a niche gaming playstyle and I have no interest in it.

5) Sidekicking:

Eq2, CoH, and GW2 all advertise it, and I like it. One of the big negatives in SWTOR for me, was that my wife took about 4 months to hit level 50, and in this title when we were both playing I rarely played with her during the time she was leveling. Same thing with my best friend, and I just dont like it. I play MMO's to enjoy with friends, dont make it more challenging for me to do that. I'm fine with de-leveling myself to play with a friend. 

6) Exploring:

The awe I felt in UO exploring a virtual world was exceeded in only one game: Star Wars Galaxies. I loved taking safari's to planets with friends, and exploring them, seeing what was there. There felt like danger could be lurking around the next corner. I'll never forget my first safari to Endor with friends, or one to Talus searching for a rare pet for a friend to tame.

Exploring is something that never lasts because eventually you are comfortable going anywhere and everywhere, but some of my strongest memories of the genre are thru exploration, so dont underestimate it's power.

7) Housing:

Housing is an easy catch-all for what I'm driving at. I want to stake an claim on this virtual world. I want to be emotionally tied to the game above and beyond simple PvE and PvP. Ultima Online, Star Wars Galaxies, and Everquest 2 all did a great job or tying me into the world. (Lord of the Rings Online never gave me quite the same tie.) This is something that can be instanced, but that extra reason to play other than PvE and PvP is well worth the developer investment.


8) Crafting:

There is good and bad. I want worthwile crafting, crafting that has a meaning. I dont want to make items 3 levels below me with level appropriate materials, I dont want to spend 8 hours making a single ship (Thank you very much Vanguard at release) I dont want to hit max level crafting and realize that nobody will buy my items since they can get better via dungeons and raids. I dont want the only crafting profession to be worth a damn to be a cooking, or alchemy whichever type makes the useable buff items,


So it's a long list, and I could probably add more to it if I really wanted. I'm a few days away from trying out the Guild Wars 2 weekend beta event, but for the first time in a long time, I'm ready to have an objective experience. I'm ready to look for things that I find fun, and judge the game based on what it offers, not based on who made it, or what the IP is.

No you are not going to see me list things like graphics, animations and combat here. There are a few items that would utterly dissuade me from a game, but even a game like Mount & Blade can look horrible but be extremely fun to play because of the concepts behind it.  What it boils down to, are that these things are going to be about style, and personal preference, but arent going to be core items to determine a game that I'll enjoy.

I'll never recapture great moments from my MMO past, and I will always look back fondly on some titles, but it's time to find the game that will build the next set of great memories, and I'm going to start by finding a game that meets as many of these 8 items as I can, and go from there.

Communities and Guilds

So I've been thinking about this for quite a while, and I've come to the conclusion that there are game communities, and game guilds and they definitely are not the same thing. For the better part of the last 5 years, I've actively been a part of an online gaming community. I was one of the first members, an officer, and someone who cared deeply about the direction of the community. I took an active part in redrawing our charter, and trying to build a community that could put down lasting roots in an MMO. You see, despite being around as a community for 5 years, we had never put down lasting roots in a single MMO, and the pattern was alarming similar each and every game that we delved into. Bursts of activity early, zerg recruit all sorts of people, and around 60 days post launch members would start leaving the guild or the game, officers stopped honoring their duties and would disappear as well. On average, I'd say 90-120 days post release (sometimes longer, sometimes less) the guild would be down to single digit active members from highs of 80-100 active players.

The general sentiment of the officer team was that it was never the guild or the structure, but it was always just the games themselves, that nobody liked them. Considering that Vanguard and Final Fantasy 14 were titles we ventured into, I cant entirely argue with that idea.. I started to disagree with that sentiment last summer though with our Rift experience. While I did not get deeply involved in the game itself, I saw a divide in how a casual community operates. I saw what happened when people who were committed raiding types needed to pull people who were very casual, unfamiliar with min/maxing, and did not invest time outside of game to learn about encounters, were all put together. It was honestly a disaster.

This is where I started thinking about the differences between a game guild, and a gaming community. A community has a diverse group of members, quite often without any real bar to membership, and this means a vast variety of playstyles. Nothing at all wrong with that, in fact it's a very positive place for people to be. A game guild on the other hand usually is drawn together because they share a common interest in a single game, and they also usually have a membership application that helps them determine if an applicant shares a similar style of play. Extending this line of thought, while there is no guarantee a guild will last, it is my thought that a game guild has a better chance of an extended lifespan in a game than an online gaming community. The difference is level of investment in the game, versus investment in a community.

In order for a gaming community to make a lasting home in a title, I think that certain things are needed. The online community I belonged to had a relatively flat leadership structure, but I dont think that translates well into a game. I think that there has to be a single leader type. This doesnt mean a dictatorship, most decisions can be made among an officer team, but there has to be a person who makes the hard calls, or the unpopular calls, and does what needs to be done. Flat leadership too often means people dont take responsibility, and you end up debating for weeks over issues that need to be handled in hours or days.

The community itself needs to have strong leaders, and multiple voices. If there is a single strong leader, people again take the path of least resistance and just go along with him/her because they dont want to have a debate. If there are two strong voices you end up more often than not with cliques that form, or popularity contests going on.  This eliminates honest debates over merit, and people make decisions for reasons other than merit of the sides being presented. Short version is that if either of those things happen, you have piss poor people in leadership positions, because they dont feel comfortable, or confident enough to express their own opinions. So how does this happen? I think this happens when you dont accurately identify leadership characteristics in people, and you reward long time members and contributors for service, instead of making officers our of people who are truly leaders. Just because you contribute doesnt mean you are a leader. contributors can come in all shapes and sizes. Some folks who are contributors are leaders, and it isnt accurate that every contributor is a leader. I think this is a style that proves the adage: "The true test of a man's intelligence is the degree to which he agrees with you." You may have harmony (does anyone sense that I was the abrasive voice more often than not?) but you doom yourself to fighting uphill battles to have success as a guild in an MMO. This doesnt mean you cant do it, it just means you have to work harder, and the work falls on less and less shoulders. I believe the odds are against success with that format.

So after 5 years involved in the community I exchanged an e-mail with the founder, and resigned. Although I had not been active with the community in a few months, I got a nice send off post, and I wish everyone there well. These are tremendously great people who I respect, admire, and think will have fun in any title the venture into, however I believe the Chicago Cubs have a better track record of World Series success than they will of finding a game to make a lasting home. I'm sure it can happen, but I wont put bets on when. I'll still continue to game with several friends I met thru the community, but I've decided that for my next title, I want to play with people who will be there, and be active 120 days after launch. Maybe I'll pick wrong, but after 5 years of doing it one way, I'm going to find a group of people that embody what I want to find in a game, and I'll get to know them, and enjoy a title with them. Oddly enough, some of my best and longest game experiences were started just that way, and now I wonder why I got away from that.

Introduction

So why would anyone pay attention to the rantings and musing of a MMO fan? MMO's are seeming a niche game genre with a fanbase that seems to become more and more bitter with each new release in the genre. Are my rantings and musings that much different, or better than you'd find on a site with devoted forums for them? Simple answer is, of course, yes.

Okay, maybe they really arent better or any more worth reading, but after 13 odd years of playing mainstream MMO's I'd like to think that I've learned a few things, not just about the genre itself, but the people who play the games, notably myself. While I dont think I speak for anyone other than myself, I think after 13 years I'm starting to find some truth not only about the genre, but about how my own tastes have evolved. So if you have a passing interest in games, or MMO's, then maybe I'll have something to say that will make you laugh, smile, or get mad (I tend to get people mad quite often) and it'll be worth your time as I begin discussing this journey.

I began my addiction to true MMO's back in 1998 with Ultima Online. I'd see some of the AOL games like Neverwinter Nights, but Ultima Online was the game that brought me to the genre in a modern format. I was working at Best Buy, and picked up the game on a whim, and was blown away when I got into the game and was able to play with hundreds of other people at the same time. I'm sure there were thousands, but to me it was hundreds. Here was a world, populated with other people in front of their computers, and it was a persistent world, activity went on even when I wasnt there. It was the begining of a love afair with with genre.

This addiction could have been nipped in the bud fairly early, but the woman that I was dating decided that if she wanted to spend time with me, she would give this "MMO-thing" a try. We've been married now for 11 years, and while she isnt as passionate about MMO's as I am, it has turned into something that we can do together. So the one person who probably had the power, enabled me!

My journey has twisted and turned though many, if not most of the AAA MMO's on the market since. I've made lifelong friends while playing. People who started out as just pixels on a screen that I talked with, into people I talk to daily, have visited, and one friend I think so much of as a person, he's the godfather of my daughter.  My point here, is that recently I read this Norweigan idiot Behring said he took a year off to play World of Warcraft, is simply that there are idiots everywhere, but they are definitely the exception. In fact why was the fact he played World of Warcraft newsworthy? Quick, someone find out if he liked Oreo's too. Far more good people around, and it's a shame one moron can draw attention to a game or a genre in that way.

Recent history has taken me thru a long phase as a fan and of Star Wars: The Old Republic, but as a fan, I've sat down and done a lot of thinking recently, which has partly inspired me to write this blog. I'm not the same person, or the same player I was 13 years ago, I want different things, and what was important to me then, doesnt seem to be all that important today. Sitting down and evaluating has led me to some interesting and fun conclusions, and I think that's where this blog is headed....for now.

Hope you enjoy the the ride.