TSW was a great game, with major flaws. The first being a complete lack of group content outside of dungeons, I can think of maybe 3 quests that require a group, the rest are practically trivialized by even having another person with you.
Then the leveling speed, I played the game for 4 hours a day, a bit much for the average player I'll admit, but 15 days later I'm at the highest QL gear working on upgrading to the higher rarities. I've finished the majority of the main quests. A month later I have all my skills complete and over 75% of the ability wheel complete. I can tank dungeons, I can Heal them and most elite dungeons I'm top DPS. Granted I hate tanking and healing so I'm not that good at either of them.
The next major problem is the dungeons. 5 dungeons pre level cap, and most are so easy it's not even funny. the 8 "elites" aren't much harder other than 1 or 2. Nightmares are a bit harder but nothing the average player can't handle(though finding a group might be the hard part).
Then the PvP, king of the hill is more of a zerg fest, and their capture the flag type game is almost never open. There just isn't enough people queing for the servers. the persistant PvP zone is a zergfest, one that's always unbalanced and is way too small of a zone to even support the player cap.
Then other random problems. The client sucks, my core I7 2630QM with a GTX 560m can't even get above 30-40 FPS on low half the time. I have cabal members who are constantly crashing. the problems are all over the boards with very few people even being able to get near a steady 60 FPS. Crafting sucks, most won't even use the crafting system except for a few potions for Nightmare mode dungeons and glyphs to enchant their gear.
Now on the bright side, the story is top notch, the quests are great(but too easy), the investigation missions are very well done, the combat is decent and the devs are relatively active on the forums. Customer service is great, sure some people have had a few problems with inexperienced GMs but my only attempt to petition a GM ended 5 minutes later with my problem solved(a undeletable quest item, actually about 4 copies of the quest items due to repeating the quest).
The game would of made a great Singleplayer game, a MMORPG, no. If you go into the game expecting to play Diablo you won't be disappointed. If you into the game expecting to play a real MMO, you will be.
On the bright side, I'm kind of happy I got a lifetime subscription. maybe every few months i'll return to finish the new content the added in(mostly the quests and such) and enjoy that. but as a long term game it's not really good enough for it.
I'm pleased to see Funcom struggling. It was incredibly naive of them to believe they'd get amazing sales after the AoC fiasco.
MMO players have a pretty long memory and they do not forgive easily. I wouldn't even touch their free trial, that's how badly they treated their players with AoC (and continue to).
Just a few thoughts. I totally agree with the notion that you can't judge a final game by its beta (the client kept crashing on me, for example). I'd really love to give TSW a chance, but the cost is just a little bit too steep for me. Unfortunately, I live in Europe, which means that the box price is €60, instead of $60, which currently means a 23% higher cost (not to mention the subscription fee, which, you can probably guess, is €15, instead of $15). Yes, I am aware of the free trials,but let's be realistic - if someone claims that you can have an informed decision over whether to buy and subscribe to an MMO after playing it for a week, then he/she has a very unrealistic expectation or simply lying.
Then, there comes the announcement, just a month after release, that things are not going as well as they were believed to be. A logical assumption would be that there may be a change in the revenue model pending. In that case, a sensible decision would be to wait a little bit more, because if it turns out I will be able to play the game without paying the upfront cost for the box, then I'll be losing that €60 right away. To be honest, I can afford it; however, given that this is what approximately my monthly utility bills cost me, I will certainly think twice before spending the money, before being certain I will actually play the game for a long time.
In the end, I think that games that follow this pattern - a lot of story but ultimately a single-player RPG/adventure game approach to quests - should consider dumping subscription in exchange for an upfront cost only. This is something I could more easily accept, as I will be able to play when I can, and as much time as I want, instead of feeling sorry that I'm wasting my monthly subscription fee. The other option I would consider is no upfront cost for the box, but monthly subscription, as EVE does. I just think that the model with charging a box fee AND subscription is getting outdated, especially when you cannot guarantee there will be something to interest you when you reach top level.
Of course, I realise it is still too early to give a final judgement, so I guess I'll wait for a couple of months to see what the opinion of players is. I hope the game pulls through, as it does have a unique concept, which drew my interest when it was first announced. However, I do hope it doesn't turn into anything like SWTOR, where it turned out that after you complete your class story, you don't have much else to do.
I bought the game, and pay a monthly fee, and will continue to do for a long time. There are a number of reasons why the game is good.
The Wheel minigame, never in my life have I spent an hour or more a day, staring at skills to tweak my PvE, PvP, and solo builds.
Some of the quests are difficult, learning curve is a big seller for me, the more brain cells firing the better.
It's all in the details, type /sit and move your camera, watch your characters head move with it. Granted not anything OMFG type thing, but it is interesting to note the kind of depth that went into making the game, provided you pay attention to the details.
Combat is smooth and fluid, for me at least, hate too much twitchy battleing style as I am older and my reflexes aren't as good as they used to be. The animations of some abilities could be improved, but that's been in the works since closed beta and changing little by little.
Dev interaction with the community, is top notch Ragnar and team are very personable with their player base. Ever see a dev troll, lol
The player community is probably one of the best I've experinced, not only in PvE, but PvP (Grim), as well. They really make the game fun.
This is a niche game, no doubt, with the average age of the player base being 35+, you know what niche exactly it caters to. But to note that with a solid foundation to build on, and 7 years of content already planned out, and 10 years wrth of research, going into the game, I'd say it will probably be one of the best MMOs to play, at least to the niche it's catering to.
Comments
TSW was a great game, with major flaws. The first being a complete lack of group content outside of dungeons, I can think of maybe 3 quests that require a group, the rest are practically trivialized by even having another person with you.
Then the leveling speed, I played the game for 4 hours a day, a bit much for the average player I'll admit, but 15 days later I'm at the highest QL gear working on upgrading to the higher rarities. I've finished the majority of the main quests. A month later I have all my skills complete and over 75% of the ability wheel complete. I can tank dungeons, I can Heal them and most elite dungeons I'm top DPS. Granted I hate tanking and healing so I'm not that good at either of them.
The next major problem is the dungeons. 5 dungeons pre level cap, and most are so easy it's not even funny. the 8 "elites" aren't much harder other than 1 or 2. Nightmares are a bit harder but nothing the average player can't handle(though finding a group might be the hard part).
Then the PvP, king of the hill is more of a zerg fest, and their capture the flag type game is almost never open. There just isn't enough people queing for the servers. the persistant PvP zone is a zergfest, one that's always unbalanced and is way too small of a zone to even support the player cap.
Then other random problems. The client sucks, my core I7 2630QM with a GTX 560m can't even get above 30-40 FPS on low half the time. I have cabal members who are constantly crashing. the problems are all over the boards with very few people even being able to get near a steady 60 FPS. Crafting sucks, most won't even use the crafting system except for a few potions for Nightmare mode dungeons and glyphs to enchant their gear.
Now on the bright side, the story is top notch, the quests are great(but too easy), the investigation missions are very well done, the combat is decent and the devs are relatively active on the forums. Customer service is great, sure some people have had a few problems with inexperienced GMs but my only attempt to petition a GM ended 5 minutes later with my problem solved(a undeletable quest item, actually about 4 copies of the quest items due to repeating the quest).
The game would of made a great Singleplayer game, a MMORPG, no. If you go into the game expecting to play Diablo you won't be disappointed. If you into the game expecting to play a real MMO, you will be.
I'm pleased to see Funcom struggling. It was incredibly naive of them to believe they'd get amazing sales after the AoC fiasco.
MMO players have a pretty long memory and they do not forgive easily. I wouldn't even touch their free trial, that's how badly they treated their players with AoC (and continue to).
Just a few thoughts. I totally agree with the notion that you can't judge a final game by its beta (the client kept crashing on me, for example). I'd really love to give TSW a chance, but the cost is just a little bit too steep for me. Unfortunately, I live in Europe, which means that the box price is €60, instead of $60, which currently means a 23% higher cost (not to mention the subscription fee, which, you can probably guess, is €15, instead of $15). Yes, I am aware of the free trials,but let's be realistic - if someone claims that you can have an informed decision over whether to buy and subscribe to an MMO after playing it for a week, then he/she has a very unrealistic expectation or simply lying.
Then, there comes the announcement, just a month after release, that things are not going as well as they were believed to be. A logical assumption would be that there may be a change in the revenue model pending. In that case, a sensible decision would be to wait a little bit more, because if it turns out I will be able to play the game without paying the upfront cost for the box, then I'll be losing that €60 right away. To be honest, I can afford it; however, given that this is what approximately my monthly utility bills cost me, I will certainly think twice before spending the money, before being certain I will actually play the game for a long time.
In the end, I think that games that follow this pattern - a lot of story but ultimately a single-player RPG/adventure game approach to quests - should consider dumping subscription in exchange for an upfront cost only. This is something I could more easily accept, as I will be able to play when I can, and as much time as I want, instead of feeling sorry that I'm wasting my monthly subscription fee. The other option I would consider is no upfront cost for the box, but monthly subscription, as EVE does. I just think that the model with charging a box fee AND subscription is getting outdated, especially when you cannot guarantee there will be something to interest you when you reach top level.
Of course, I realise it is still too early to give a final judgement, so I guess I'll wait for a couple of months to see what the opinion of players is. I hope the game pulls through, as it does have a unique concept, which drew my interest when it was first announced. However, I do hope it doesn't turn into anything like SWTOR, where it turned out that after you complete your class story, you don't have much else to do.
I bought the game, and pay a monthly fee, and will continue to do for a long time. There are a number of reasons why the game is good.
The Wheel minigame, never in my life have I spent an hour or more a day, staring at skills to tweak my PvE, PvP, and solo builds.
Some of the quests are difficult, learning curve is a big seller for me, the more brain cells firing the better.
It's all in the details, type /sit and move your camera, watch your characters head move with it. Granted not anything OMFG type thing, but it is interesting to note the kind of depth that went into making the game, provided you pay attention to the details.
Combat is smooth and fluid, for me at least, hate too much twitchy battleing style as I am older and my reflexes aren't as good as they used to be. The animations of some abilities could be improved, but that's been in the works since closed beta and changing little by little.
Dev interaction with the community, is top notch Ragnar and team are very personable with their player base. Ever see a dev troll, lol
The player community is probably one of the best I've experinced, not only in PvE, but PvP (Grim), as well. They really make the game fun.
This is a niche game, no doubt, with the average age of the player base being 35+, you know what niche exactly it caters to. But to note that with a solid foundation to build on, and 7 years of content already planned out, and 10 years wrth of research, going into the game, I'd say it will probably be one of the best MMOs to play, at least to the niche it's catering to.