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wow people still play this game?
belua
Member Posts: 3
I played when it first came out, it was very buggy and I lost interest pretty quick as did i suppose almost everyone else I am surprised its still around, for those that play id like to hear why, just out of curiosity.
Comments
maybe the game isnt for you - some ppl love it and others dont
why they love it?
1. community is very much a community - very freindly and like a village everyone knows everyone. no real pvp (can do it with mates for a laugh at spire) - so no real conflict between players. they are freindly to new players who are freindly and courteous, and once you are passed your 2-week trial and subscribe (there is a /command to see when you started) players are more willing to invest time, money and effort in helping you out (since you are now a member of the community, not just on a 2-week freebie)
2. dragons - who doesnt wanna be a dragon, and fly? totally different game to bipeds (non-dragons) so play both
3. uber-peds - multiclassing make bi-peds v. powerful for those with dedication. it would take a lifetime to max out all 29 (adventure) classes on one character
4. crafting - so many things to make, so many craft schools, so many ways to tech (improve) items. google "horizons craft calculator" a godsend for players just to keep track of what they need for that triple-teched T5 set of armour
5. plots - build houses, storage silos, crafting structures, hedges, trees, paths, patios, fountains, shops or whatever on your plots. dragons can also build lairs full of awe and wonder to store their stuff, and do their crafting
6. huge world - its big, games like WoW and EQ/EQII are tiny in comparison
7. community, community, community
the games not perfect - but none are
uhhh
2) uhh no its the same game just a different avatar. Multiclassing is not a substitute for content and therefore does not make the biped game different. As a dragon you can fly as a biped you cannot. As a biped you can multiclass as a dragon you cannot. Thats the only difference.
3) no... takes about 1 year. if thats a lifetime in an MMO than yeah.
4) yes and you will spend that lifetime hunting tech components for all that crap. Again this is not a substitute for content.
5) yes but your plot is just an extension of your vault. You cannot put a chair in that house. Its an empty house that just serves to be an extra spot to store those tech components and the various non decaying sets of armor you have.
6) no... sorry Everquest 1's world is 3 times as big as Horizons. WoW with TBC is just as big as horizons. All with plenty of content for those that like quests and those that just like to grind. In horizons you can run the entire gambit of it and never see a single mob to fight. A large world means nothing if its empty.
however... the game has some merits. I would have played it as a second game had Vitrium decided not to raise subscription costs. Sorry HZ is not worth the standard $14.95 a month MMO rate.
A game is not the sum of checks on a checklist. Horizons has a unique feel to it, and one that some like a great deal.
Dragons are far and away the most popular race; flight, lairs (very well done), and somewhat more of a quest-based game. The Adult Rite of Passage is an awesome quest series.
Other races: felines, lizards, dryads (small winged humanoids), elves, dwarves, halfgiants, fiends, humans, and gnomes; where appropriate, with mobile tails.
The crafting scheme is still unique, and my favorite so far in any mmo.
Your plot can be landscaped, and craft stations and storage silos can be put on it, as well as housing. There are also occasional community building projects as well; a new bridge or mine for recent examples.
A budget membership is available; $9.95 I think, and the main limitation is that you cannot buy a plot. A free trial of course, and a military appreciation membership that allows two simultaneous logins on one account; also $9.95??
Under new management, and based on their actions, they are by far the most sensible owners yet. They usually deliver first, then inform. In a few key areas, they have asked the players, and actually listened.
Edit: I should have mentioned that the player base fell and continued to fall until some major changes were made. Dragons were originally frustrating to play, due to errors and bad design decisions, and the new player experience was not good. Both areas had major changes, and new player trial retention went from 2% to 58%; the player base grew, the game hit breakeven financially, and so was sold by the venture capitalist. The new owners were a rolling disaster, and the game was resold to the newest owners, ex-developers, who really know what they are doing and are very dedicated.
I tried to come back to Horizons last night, but I could not get the IE Login to work, everytime I tried to create a new character and hit "Play Horizons" the window froze up? Any suggestions on fixes for this?
Sorry to hear about your troubles Neonaka; I'm not that good technically. Try again of course; their server provider was having problems two days ago, and may have again. (They emailed an apology to all subscribers.) You can file a trouble ticket; their customer support is now quite good.
http://support.istaria.com/
I know it's being worked on now, but so far, Horizons is not reliably Vista-compatible.
http://community.istaria.com/ The technical forum might be of help also.
Well I am one of those who refuse to use Vista ( as of yet )
My system is nice tho
WinXP
SLi GeForce 8800GTX
2Gigs of Corsair XMS
6000+ AMD Chip
So Im not sure why it would freeze the webpage.
As in it has "Not Responding" Error.
I even let it sit for 5 minutes thinking it just needed to catch up. Still a no go. I have accepted the Active X and even used IE browser vs my usual Firefox browser still a no-go. Also have up to date .NET so that rules that issue out. I really wish I could get it working again tho my level 50 dragon is prolly dusty... assuming it is even still there as I played on Shadow Shard and there is no longer a shadow shard... :-(
I strongly suggest filing a ticket.
I remember long ago setting Hz as a trusted site. Try turning off antivirus to see if that helps, and add Hz to your firewall as an allowed site. Some suggest turning off the firewall as a troubleshooting aid, but I don't like that idea at all. MMOGChart estimates that the sub base has quadrupled since the new owner-devs took over, so it is possible to get in
.
Unless Shadow was a European server, your dragon should still be there... somewhere. No characters have ever been deleted, although the European database is in deep limbo. I guess that the Euro database will someday be ported to an American server, but the new owners don't make promises until they've completed the job. There have been some happy stories of players being reunited with long-dormant avatars.
With the improvements to the client over the years, I run Hz smoothly on a 7800GS AGP card with max view distance, max textures, no shadows or terrain clutter. You should do a lot better than that.
Thanks Dand3!
That was the issue, Windows firewall, cut the firewall off and it fired right up! I'm behind a router and use 3rd party antivirus and other protections so cutting windows firewall off doesn't really bother me.
I signed up under a free trial account to start to see if the game is fun as i remember it and if so, I will pay to reactivate my other account. Which do you play on so I can move my dragon and bi-ped to where you play?
I am on Order, but RL issues have caused me to not be playing anything much right now. Order has fewer players, good roleplay, very good community. You might start an alt on Chaos and Order to see which you prefer.
A good guild helps a lot. My guild, Order of the Phoenix has a few players; Death-Knell probably is on most. Strata is a good guild, and Axe and Anvil is being revived I think; I'm in AnA in LotRO. There is also a very strong dragon RP guild. See also the community forums. http://community.istaria.com/web/Default.aspx
I am quite sure you'll find the game much improved since you left. A lot of content and a continent have been added...
Edit: Check your PM's.
Yep many people have returned and some, just like me, have subscribed for the first time!
Strata is very active at the mo, drop in on strata recruiting, if your EU then i'm always there (Preat) or if your american then everyone else is always there
Failing that there are quite a few of the older guild making comebacks, well organise with player cities.
Can't comment on Chaos as i only play on Order.
Maybe we'll cya around.
Well guys, after re-activating my old account. I am very glad that I did so. The game is very enjoyable and the community is still great and helpful. I found a very nice guild on Chaos and they have taken me in and helped me get back on track in the game.
Last time i played Horizons, I played on Shadow Shard which no longer is available and also I played a Dragon when things like Adult and Ancient RoP wasn't implemented into the game yet. So I had alot of catching up to do on how the new game features worked and the path I needed to work on.
I got all that lined out and I must say I am having a blast.
Horizons, tho never the best game on planet earth has always had a few things that no other game can't touch.
1. The community of players can only be compared to 2 games in history and I have played them all. Golden Age Everquest and Golden Age DAoC. When these 2 games first came out they had a community like Horizons, what differs is this as time progress, both of these games community fell to the elitist mindset and players quickly became egomaniacs and rude. This is something Horizons has never had a problem with, players play the game for what is inside, not how powerful one individual can be.
2. Just like no game in history can ever beat DAoC revolutionary PvP through massive RvR combat. Except maybe the upcoming Warhammer because mythic is making it. No game can touch Horizons crafting and player built cities and economy.
3. Tho most people would shun multi-classing a single avatar. This allows players of horizons to play just 1 character for thier entire lifespan of playing Horizons, grow very attached to that character and explore all regions of the game without having to make 8 characters to do so.
Now if Virtrium will just front the cash for a new updated graphics engine, put some extra time into the models and terrain and beef of the exploration factor of the game, they will have a contender for anything on the market today.
They need to front the cash for a new server or combine the players from both current servers and wipe the other for a fresh start, advertise a new server launch for a month or so and get some new players in there who aren't interested in starting on a 4 year old server like me.
I'm not sure I understand the older server objection; a high percentage of advanced players? Established guilds? Everything built up?
I'm not sure what the ratio of advanced players will be. Back in the days just before the Tulga owner sold the game, Hz had been advertising, and had improved the beginners' and dragons' games a lot. As a result, we had a good number of new players tryin' the trial and staying. Older players, of 2-3 years were aging out, and the situation was pretty healthy.
When EI/PMI bought the game, billing problems, lack of marketing, and the absence of any development or bug fixing pretty well cut off the supply of new players. Now that Virtrium has the game, the billing problems are resolved, new content and bug fixes are being pushed live, and I expect pretty soon we'll see some marketing, perhaps after some new content worth crowing about goes live. So I expect the number of young 'uns to improve again.
Most building is on individual plots, wih some community building, like a new bridge or mine. If you buy a built-up plot, you can tear down the buildings, and build your own, with 80% of the old materials being re-usable. So I don't think the " it's all been built" issue is correct.
When I played Horizons, the rebuilding of the world was a lot of fun and you won't experience that unless you play on a new server launch. I don't see playing on an established server as a positive. It's always been more fun to start on a new world where most players are meeting for the first time and establishing their reputations. As a Crafter, I wouldn't want to compete trading wares with master craftsman of 4 years with loyal customers.
It seems this game has been through a lot. There were numerous changes to the game which made it very dynamic and very much like life. The rise and downfall of evil in this game has been apparent throughout the years and I believe this is why many still play. It is a game with a culture and lifestyle of its own.
It isn't the easiest game to level in, or the easiest game to play overall. The community is a mature one, and you will likely see friendly faces, as well as familiar faces in this game.
I began playing a few months after release, and needless to say that was quite some time ago. Games have evolved since then, but this game was one of my first MMO's. I re-subscribed a few times to revisit my guild and check out whats going on. This game has certainly had its ups and downs, but all in all, it seems to be quite near the same atmosphere as it was when I began playing.
Yesterday was the 4th anniversary of Hz' release. To help mark the occasion, http://community.istaria.com/forum/showthread.php?t=17345 was released, updating the development status. For the new client to be so close to release, so soon after the new owners took over, indicates to me that some client work may have been done by "devs-in-exile".
The Client and Vista priorities were obvious, and the spawn system was the "winner" of a "What most needs fixing?" poll. So I think it's an excellent set of priorities, and impressively ambitious. So far they've under-promised and over-delivered. Quite a pleasant change.
On the topic of dragons, I have to ask: Did they ever fix flying? All the accounts that I have ever known of dragon flight (including that of a friend in game who saw one flying) said that it was quite slow and therefore not fun.
I actually played Horizons myself not long after it came out. There was some potential there and at first I really loved the game. Then it sort of fell apart. Maybe they have changed some things, I don't know.
1) They had an in game event in which a plague was spreading through the game world. Player characters could contract this disease. The dragon player characters could find a cure and then remove the disease from the others. At first, I thought this was an great idea, quite unique and interesting............Then when I caught the disease for a second time, a friend told me I should just let my character die to get rid of it since the death penalty in Horizons was pretty light. This revelation made the event so that it was no longer worthwhile.
2) As mentioned in one, dying just was not all that bad. I did not feel the rush of not wanting to have my character die like in other MMO's.
3) I did some crafting. In the beginning, it was fun. However, as time went on, the crafting quests began to be insufficient to fully level my trade. Not only was it a grind, it was a very boring grind, and it was taking forever. So again, something that started out fun ceased to be worthwhile.
I don't know if they ever fixed these kinds of problems with Horizons. If it's your kind of game, then more power to you. I can certainly understand the draw of the community aspect at least. When I played WoW, there were a lot of jerks out there (and some really cool people too), so I get wanting a friendly and tight-knit community. However, at least when I played it, the game quickly became bland and uninspiring, which was sad after its promise.
The zymosis morbidae (?) plague certainly was a while ago. It was a mistake; it was only supposed to be a Withered Aegis attack, that was local. Instead it was contagious, and NPC's caught it and it got out of hand. Ambrosia sellers and gatekeepers spread it to all who portaled... Oops. The dragons did nobly, volunteering a lot of time healing.
Flight speed; first I've heard the slow complaint. Dragons got a lot of love which is part of what turned the subscriber leakage around. They're much less frustrating to play now, and the Ancients are formidable. Perhaps speed techs for scales were not available then.
DP is light; it was a great relief for those of us who'd played EQ. The problem with harsh dp's is that it's not an exciting challenge the zillionth time; it eventually becomes a major drag for most players. And the market is simply not made up of hard core players; see the Vanguard saga.
Crafting, and especially construction are repetitive. Some players love it, and have hit 100 in all crafts. Others spend all their time adventuring. Whatever floats your cuppa tea. New content seems to be primarily new quests for adventurers, with crafting development primarily confectioner class completion.
http://community.istaria.com/forum/showthread.php?t=17345 is a nice rundown of what's in development. Vista and the new client are both very important; I like the priorities.
Since you played, a lot of territory and some new critters were added; the Ancient Rite, quests, epic monsters (and loot) and a revamp of the tutorial, beginning, and low level areas were completed. Most importantly, the new owners seem to be the best by far; and the volunteer efforts of previous devs are helping make this group exceptionally productive.
No MMO fits all; some players have stuck through thick and mighty thin, because it suits them so well. Can't say whom it would fit, that's what free trials are for.
To directly answer the OP, yes, people still play this game.
Since the acquisition of all game assets by Virtrium the number of new players I've seen of an evening has gone up by a lot...
I've tended to re-sub to Horizons every year, around November, since I purchased the Atari box at Best Buy back in 2005(?)... I'd log in, see what was going on, see if things had improved any, then log out and unsubscribe after a few days.
Needless to say I didn't progress very far in the game with this play style.
About a month ago I did the free trial just to see if anything had changed and, oddly enough, they had. Sure, the game is still a collection of old battle scars and has more rough edges than smooth ones, but that ads to its charm I suppose.
Ultimately, last week I went ahead and gave Virtrium the $150 or so for a year's subscription... I've been playing every night for the hour or so I get after work a month now, so I figure I might be in it for the long haul.
As I've played a lot of MMOs over the years, I guess I should draw some comparisons for anyone curious. For this I will contrast and compare Horizons with World of Warcraft as that’s the game the majority will have at least come in contact with:
Firstly, Horizons is not a "gateway MMO" (a new term being tossed around GDC these days). If anyone remembers the internet before AOL, that's Horizons - lots of mature folks co-habiting a virtual world and most have had some kind of stake in its creation such as building homes, bridges, entire towns or freeing some of the playable races.
This is completely counter to something like WoW, which is a textbook "gateway MMO". WoW has a very shallow learning curve and very little in unsupervised “figure it out on your own” - in fact you'll be told, shown, and have beaten into you everything you need to know by level 5. This, much like AOL did with the internet, makes it very easy for people to get into the 'MMO thing' with WoW... Where the problem lies is that the lower the bars for entry, the lower the level of person partaking - and before you know it you have forums full of useless trash and a game full of smack talking 12 year olds.
In something like WoW there is no connection between the player and the world... The world exists for you to exploit by way of providing things to kill to gain levels, but little else. The world is a backdrop for the fighting that you do and actually matters so little that Blizzard would prefer you to use a flight point or a flying mount to avoid it all together once it has done its time sink function.
In Horizons the game *is* the world and centers on the players trying to save it, and themselves. To this end Horizons features functionality that allows the all-pervasive ‘bad guy’ to wreck your stuff, which you built, and which will require rebuilding to be used again.
Which leads us to another difference: In Wow the ‘bad guy’ can be anyone who is usually holed up in the bottom of some instance and who has some plan for this, that, or the other and must be vanquished – and there are hundreds of little bad guys scattered around the world for your enjoyment. The other form of ‘bad guy’ in WoW is the opposing faction – we don’t exactly know why we hate them and are allowed to off them every chance we get, but that’s the way it is.
In Horizons the ‘bad guy’ is the Withered Aegis, a nameless, faceless force of evil and it’s everywhere, all the time, and trying like hell to kill you. This leads to every player being on *your* side against the unified forces of the ‘bad guy’ and creates a much more epic feeling than beating up Gruul for the 10th week in a row… I mean *why* are we killing Prince Malchezaar again? Oh, right, tier 4 helm - I forgot, sorry…
And this segues into the differences in loot: In WoW you beat up a stream of increasing level of difficulty bad guys who drop fun prizes so that you can collect the whole set.
In Horizons you do something very similar so that you can get item drops that allow crafters to make some seriously epic weapons, armor, spells, and utility thingies…
Ultimately the major difference between WoW and Horizons is that WoW is kinda like a neat amusement park; it’s full of fun rides and neat stuff to see – and every now and then they add a ride or two, maybe even a themed section, and some times if you’re lucky there is some gangland violence to partake in.
Horizons on the other hand is more like a summer camp set in a horror movie…You spend a lot of time building things, hiking around the woods, hanging out with friends, learning new skills to broaden yourself as a person - and dodging the otherworldly skeletons, zombies and demons bent on global domination or at least separating you from your soul, permanently.
First i would like to say thank you
i havent played Horizons for a couple of years now but after reading the posts i am going to fire up the gaming rig and check out the new features and see if it could once again be my fav mmo
thanks again
Hey,
yeah, people still do.
I loved this game. It's a cool community with cool people, has a wonderful crafts-system, and I love the races one can play.
And so, my heart broke when one day, I simply couldn't log in, to find out that the european server was closed, and there was no possibility I could log onto the american server.
Actually, what it came down to was this:
The former owner said the game was dead, didn't bother much to revive it, and kept off any buying companies.
A day or two ago, I descided to see if the new site was still online, or if the american server also blew out it's last breath.... only to find out, that Vitrium blew new life into it, opening the american servers for everyone.
I was happy to read this, downloaded the client for a 14 day trial to see if they changed much.
But when I installed it about an hour ago and wanted to launch it, I bumped into errors.
Loads off them.
I descided to check the FAQ...
"Vista not supported at the moment."
Oh wait, that's true, my old computer broke, so I bought a new one, the one with that cursed windows vista OS on it......
Again, I curse vista, and really hope they solve this quickly..... or else I'd be chopping around again.
Yours Infernally,
The One Your Mother Warned You About.
Rihahn what game are you talking about there !! Cause I would like to play it.
You definitely aren't talking about Horizons. Unless of course your friend is David Bowman and he gave you the game that HZ was going to be at release but never was eh ?
I think I have a rather unique viewpiont on Horizons as I've seen enough of the game over the last four years to be able to see the changes, but I was never involved in it long enough to become jaded and have a lot of baggage regarding it. So I'm able to see the improvements and the direction the new devs are taking things as "good things" and not have my personal feelings about things as they were years ago cloud the issue.
I've run into this on the Horizon's forums too, from current players, in that any change the new owners try to make is resisted, quite vocally, due to shell-shock from the previous 3-4 years. The player base has really created about 50% or so of the game at this point in the form of history, back story, and even content and they aren't liking having "thier" world trod upon.
For example, one of the devs started a thread regarding players favorite encounters and what they saw as the most difficult MOB to vanquish... Almost immediately this developer's goals with the thread were called into question by some of the older players, who saw this as an attempt to find the easy to grind MOBs and fix them to make the game even harder... When in fact it was an attempt to discover what made a "good" encounter so that the technique could be used on new content.
As for David Bowman, I still don't view him in a very good light... Aside from his game design prowess (or lack thereof depending on who you talk to) which is a topic for a different thread, I see him as a swindler and a cheat and even given the opportunity to know him, I probably wouldn't like him.
Anyways, I hope that helps to clear up why I view things the way I do. I'm not going to color anything I report here with any rosey tint, but I'm also not going to report doom and gloom where there isn't any: Horizons appears to be in good hands now as more has been done on the game since September than has happened during the ownership of the last two companies combined. And the new owners have been *very* good at communication with the player base in both current development and future development.
Given that, and the fun that I am having each evening in the game, I feel I'm justified in saying there is some potential left in Horizons and I can reccommend anyone with a mind to should try it out to see what *they* think.
It's a game. No less, no more. Unique features of course, player-built resource processing stations, pawnbrokers, and such; multi-classing; players as flying dragons, etc., but still a game. I will never understand why, if I like a certain game, someone else sees my preference as a personal attack on their choices.
Does not compute.