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5 people's review.
Delavega86
Member Posts: 112
this is a review by me and 4 of my friends. each played a different class. reached max level, played pve and pvp.
The Good:
Combat is very very fun! most fun combat than any mmo we've played to be honest.
Runs well in low end PCs.
The Foundry, such an awesome feature. two of us that tinkered with it, loved it. time flies while playing with it.
(tho still missing many features, which limit your creativity. features present in core dungeons)
The Bad:
This game is practically P2W. shop prices are insane compared to other games. and you can pay for things that make a difference in combat. for example, get the most expensive mount and gain an advantage in PvP, or twink your low level character with max rank enchants, go max level in just a few hours by paying to level professions. etc...
PvP combat is highly imbalanced, certain classes are too powerful. game is missing any sort of "DR" mechanic. rogues 1shot people, and wizards have you perma-CC'd.
boss fights and dungeons are very unimaginative and blant. the healer cant really heal, and the tank cant agro s**t. agro is broken and people dont want guardians in their groups, since clerics always end up tanking unwillingly.
lots of bugs. for example, people often dont get ported into the arena, or after it ends they cant leave party, or after pvp they cant invite or be invited.
another thing that we found really annoying is that the game does not match you in the same instance as your friends, gulidmates, and group members. so you have to manually change instance, but hey, that means being ported back at the start of the map.
the questing is also very boring and such a drag. i admit, GW2 spoiled us, but NWO has sooo much pointless running back and forth, it gets annoying.
theres also an issue with their servers, people often get rubberbanded, and the occasional "server not responding" message.
- the game has a lot of potential, and if they fix certain things, ill be back playing for sure, even if it is p2w.
Comments
Did you enjoy the open world ?
There is a real feeling of open space when you go into a new area (instanced of course) and realise that it is a forked road about 100m long and a couple of dead ends. Follow the road .. return.. thats the "area" done, explored and now its time to go to the next for more open world experience.
Reminds me of playing a particular game in Takeshis castle where you smash around rooms 4 ft by 4 ft arranged in a huge square or a doing the kids show The Crystal Maze.
The OP is 100% right.. Combat is Great, The Foundry is great, but scrap the rest.
There is ZERO re playability, since every race/class combo starts exactly the same way. Sure there are 1-2 quests that differ as you get into your teens, but its boring as hell.
Lets see your Battle Stations /r/battlestations
Battle Station
Do you think the Foundry should be part of an MMORPG in the way it included here ?
I'd be happy for this sort of feature to be playable outside the main game world where it can't influence the virtual world and effectively make a mockery of the genre.
People should really stop praising the Foundry. Sure it's a great feature but it's half assed with way to much limitations. Creators of NWN series Persistent Worlds pretty much say Fuuuuuuck YOU to Cryptic and the Foundry.
It's like going to a place and ordering a hamburger with only the bun, the burger, lettuce, tomato, and.... that's it. The Foundry has tremendous potential and can really be something great.... IF the continue developing it, and thats a BIG if. Right now the game is typical Craptic product, too many features with none of em being good quality or too few.
Combat might be fun for an arcade hack n slash but it lacks a party's dependency on one another and on different classes that is the soul of D&D.
The rest is subjective / opinion and is fine. However I have to correct you on these two points. P2W and PvP.
Levelling a character using RL money is hardly P2W when it only takes 2 weeks to level a character, less if you play hard core. Theres no advantage to doing so either, everyone is the same at endgame.
Twink low level characters? For what? The game is balanced around people in greens until endgate.
Max level mounts are purchaseable with in game currency. Look at the second tab of the mount merchant to see the upgrade scrolls. Cash shop will just get it faster. Again, convenience, not pay to win, since it is obtainable through normal gameplay.
The only thing even remotely P2W is coalescent wards, which are needed for armor and weapon enchants. Lesser enchants are pretty easy / cheap to obtain though, and you can get wards by praying daily. Also the ability to convert in game currency to Zen pretty much negates any P2W arguments.
As for PvP, the balance is fine when looked at from group play rather than 1 vs 1. Most classes have an anti-class that is good against them. Rogues are easily killed by clerics, clerics are easily killed by GFs, GFs are easily killed by CWs, CWs are easily killed by GWFs, GWFs are easily killed by rogues. Overall the damage might be too high at 60, but thats an overall thing rather than class specific imbalance.
I like your review... Everything up until you said this game has a lot of potential... I think if they fix alot of the bugs... They could get this game to be average. I see the potential going into a different game. The foundry system will get better and players will be able to enjoy alot... But not with Neverwinter.Too much to fix to make playable..
P2W = 5 mins to buy something using your credit card
Sure you dont have to but hey the alternative is weeks of play or using exploits.
If you don't mind some advice, OP: You write the review only for people who know the game well already. People who don't know the game well or don't know it at all don't get anything out of your review. The Foundry? How should anyone, who hasn't played the game yet, know what it is? If you want to write a good review, then remember that you write it for an audience, and not just for yourself.
It might also make sense to divide your review into certain categories. You didn't mention stuff like graphics or sound at all. Or if there are any problems with the servers at times, if the game is buggy or not. You'd also need screenshots.
Still, thanks for the review.
Let's play Fallen Earth (blind, 300 episodes)
Let's play Guild Wars 2 (blind, 45 episodes)
I just started playing Neverwinter. Obviously I need to get used to 4th edition and what the company behind the computer adaptation made of it. Apart from that the combat and interaction with the environment felt mostly like a console game. I'm sure with an appropriate controller (i.e. with enough buttons) you won't need a mouse or keyboard for most aspects of gameplay. Apart from maybe character and inventory screens, etc..
My first character is a cleric. Spell and skill names are similar from what I am used from other D&D games. But similarities are mostly in the names. Character creation was familiar where you choose (rather roll) the 6 ability scores: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom & Dexterity. How that will affect your adventuring career I cannot see right now. After that you can chose a faith. Chose the visuals.
Actually the combat didn't feel that much action oriented as it was praised. When using spells/skills you're practically rooted in place. In between that you can push two times a movement key (w,a,s or d) and slide in that direction and out of danger. Jumping and running feels a bit clunky. So far I have unlocked 4 skills/spells of which I use mostly 1 and two others when their timers have expired. So it's practically mashing 1-3 keys (apart from movement keys). Let's see how that will change later. Live in the low levels doesn't seem that exiting so far.
My only direct comparison is DDO. But the comparison isn't really that fair. DDO is a bit dated, granted. But to me it offers more action combat (you can use skills while moving) and lots of individual build opportunities. Since I haven't got that far there is still some way to go.
Sorry, I'm going to call fanboy here. I'm not a hater of the game, it just fell very short on a few things - in fact, the exact things you state are totally fine save for PvP. Most of my ire on the game comes from failed dev promises and misinformation from the development staff.
First, the price for a max-level mount is close to 2.3 million AD. To grind that AD to do a mount unlock on a single character literally takes 2.3 months using the in-game features without a lot of AH selling. We'll say that the person gets good at the AH and somehow manages to cut that down to a month somehow.
But here's the telling point: Buy Zen, buy a mount via the cash shop. You will get that max-speed mount unlocked for all characters on your account, and if you converted that 2.3 million AD (even at a 200:1 ratio), you would have plenty left over to buy a max-level companion as well. That's just gross. NEVER buy the upgrades. EVER. They are simply not worth grinding unless you are insane and want a palomino that goes 210% speed.
As far as the wards, you have to get that by saving up 3 day's worth of prayer. It's not daily prayer reward. And the ward you get won't offset the 1% chance to combine for top-level runes or enchants. Indeed, it basically costs you $80 worth of playtime to "max out" a single rune from my calculations, which you have to do in order to remain competitive (or even get into the Gauntylgrm instances with a good group). Flat out, runes are a "pay gate". There's really no other word for it.
As to PvP, I haven't really taken part in that. Any complaints or denials as to PvP have to be taken with a grain of salt, because frankly, anyone can call "noob" or "learn to play" or whatever. Your team mates can totally stink, warping your outlook. PvP is certainly a team activity. And it certainly follows the PRS scenario in NWO. In my mind, ANY opinion, either way, is flawed.
I'm going to grant you that the figures above may have changed because of price changes, since I played in alpha, closed beta and open beta, leaving just before "full" launch (because of the terrible method of handling exploits, the devs stating that bugs I personally reported in alpha were "just discovered" and the terrible method of balancing classes). I'm going to continue on that last part, because I personally told Squez (Andy Velasquez) about the armor proc exploit after a Gauntylgrm test run in alpha testing. In fact, I killed several developers during the PvP portion of the match to demonstrate what was going on.
As far as Foundry, it's been turned into a tool so shallow (compared to how it was in beta), it's not even funny. Gillrymn was making non-linear quests with the engine, and the developers "balanced" it so that players would get no reward for doing a superbly-designed quest, nor could they ever get featured. Add on top of that the heavy-handed nerfs to XP and awards which made it take 5x as long to level in Foundry content versus developer content (which was directly opposite to their mission statement). And here's the kicker: A feature which they stated pre-development (tagged content) was in (and showed) and was demanded by alpha testers is just now (almost 6 months after release) "being added". Eh?
Don't get me started on the drow. Which still aren't available. Many months after launch.
Now, the other side: Combat is genuinely fun. It was well-designed and the game overall has great polish, for a themepark. Replayability is pretty low, but since it's free and until end-game, you really don't have to pay a dime to play, it's well worth logging in and getting a toon to 60. I always felt involved in combat, and immersion was pretty high. I liked GW2's art style/character graphics better, but, the controls are very clunky compared to NW, and the timers on abilities and general synergy and flow in combat for each class is much better handled. This coming from an old-school tab-target gamer who mentally had a lot of adjustments before getting to enjoy it.
Verdict on my part: Play it. Just don't expect to call it "home", because it doesn't really encourage longevity.