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How would you describe this game?
Viadric
Member Posts: 151
To someone who has only played WOW, GW2 ,SWTOR, and AOC.
Like is it a breath of fresh air?
Or is it your typical themepark rush to max level gear treadmill?
Comments
Caution. This site is currently experiencing a high concentration of ESO bashers. Move calmly towards the nearest exit, and find a credible gaming channel on youtube for a more accurate assessment of the game.
Thank you for your cooperation.
Caution. This site is currently experiencing a high concentration of ESO fanboys. Move calmly towards the nearest exit, and find a credible gaming channel on youtube for a more accurate assessment of the game.
Thank you for your cooperation.
*Kidding
If those are your only MMOs then this game will feel perfectly normal to you.
Questing thus far is great. There are literally 3 dungeons every 5-8 levels that get better as you level. Then there are about 6-7 public dungeons in each zone with 4-5 of them being very easy and 1 of them being fairly hard. Then there are 3-4 world bosses in the outside world per zone. Then there are Dark Anchors that spawn. Then Dark Portals which are mini versions of Dark Anchors that spawn. All this on top of the RPGesque questing in the game with stories comparable or even better than TES games and Dragon Age.
The questing in this game is by far the best questing in a themepark MMO. There is a lot to do at all times and everywhere. Sometimes it can be overwhelming. And the beautiful part is it doesn't feel gamey, it feels like a natural world with day and night cycles and weather patterns like sand storms in Al'Akir. Everything feels natural and immersive. You won't get a pop up on the middle of the screen telling you when a thing occurs or telling you what to do.
End game is the missing variable, but they nailed leveling. It is a explorers paradise.
It's a breath of fresh air to me, but because I feel it steps away from all of the games you described. If those are the only games you know, I think it is likely you will not find it enjoyable, judging from comment on various boards. (To be fair, I never played AoC, so Im not sure there.) But who knows? It's worth $50 to try out, I would say. It IS a themepark, but I do not feel any rush whatsoever and am quite content getting lost,wandering around, and managing my inventory.
For reference, the last game I played was FFXIV:ARR and it was a rush to the finish with that one for sure. FFXIV:ARR is the best WoW-clone to date IMO. However, after one day of Beta for ESO, I unsubbed FFXIV:AAR immediately.
That's just, like, my opinion, man.
So it's like GW2 where it has an enjoyable leveling experience?
Well... I would say:
- If you are rushing to max level, you are probably doing it wrong. Of course, it depends on your actual preferences.
I think this is one of the games where you actually need to play "slowly" and listen to the quests NPCs. Absorb as much context as you can, doesn't hurt to open a browser from time to time and check a bit of lore about such or such NPC.
- Gear level treadmill: I think people can reach the gear cap fairly easily right now, and in my understanding you can craft items that will serve you well (someone else will have to confirm this, I'm nowhere near endgame).
This is unlike WoW where they release a batch of dungeons, limited in access by the gear treadmill. In my understanding in ESO, you can access everything (a la GW2).
- Game is nowhere near as innovative as GW2. I find it more interesting than AOC. The combat is "dynamic" as it is in both these games, probably slower though.
- It is buggy as hell, although they are fixing stuff (I trust they will have fixed most bugs in less than a few weeks).
- It is a breath of fresh air... maybe. If you enjoy lore, stories well told and beautiful environment. It has a more "medieval", slower, human/realistic feel than all the other games (PvP does). You can tell the game is new.
I didn't like GW2's leveling experience at all. Not only did the quest design make it impossible to have good story telling. But the event system sucked when there were not a lot of players around you. It was missing the most important aspect, which was the RPG and story element. On top of that it lacked dungeons during the leveling experience at least not to the level of WoW and ESO.
To me GW2 felt like going from place to place killing mobs because it was hard to tell a story outside of your personal story. In ESO even the side quests have great RPG stories and elements.
Hi Viadric,
I have played all of the games that you've listed in your post -- all to max level (and also Rift).
I'd say it is a breath of fresh air, but it depends on what you look for in games. ESO seems to heavily emphasize immersion, which I personally love in games. The crafting is insanely detailed and slow (and hard). Exploration off the beaten path is a big deal, in the sense that there are a ton of undocumented locations that you'll stumble upon - dungeons, ruins with magical enchantments, side-quests etc. Though the biggest surprise for me though is the quality of the questing. You could say that GW2 had some pretty interesting twists on the traditional quest structure, and that was pretty cool for a while, but ESO really has the best storytelling in quest form that I've ever come across. Pretty amazing actually.
One warning is that the leveling is extremely slow - so I've felt the rush to max level to be pretty well impossible, which strangely has forced me to forget about it and enjoy the leveling process more.
Right, except for GW2 personal story which is exactly what you've just described. GW2 events are actually more akin to dark anchors, which are terrible and poorly implemented at the moment.
Still, I prefer ESO storytelling to GW2 personal story (GW2 story is very predictable).
So it has a great crafting system? That's pretty cool to know. I always felt crafting was boring in most mmo's maybe this would be different.
I would describe eso as a graphically appealing partially on rails themepark with good questing, great lore, pvp environment better than gw2 but combat mechanics inferior to gw2 (combat is "clunky") but still fun. Combat is a hybrid of action combat and hotbar. Many gamers who I know can only handle hotbar combat and they prefer wow or eq2 full hotbars and tab targeting rather than actually having to aim and click do not like eso/gw2 style combat. I personally like both styles.
the environments are top notch, game has a nice gritty atmosphere to it.
Crafting is good, Pve isn't hard but definitely more difficulty that gw2, wow, swtor.
As others said, definitely hit up YouTube and watch some videos before springing the cash. There is no gear treadmill yet ala eq2 raids and wow raids but that may come later, I'm not sure.
But personal story which had terrible writing which the most ardent fans will agree, was extremely minor compared to the entire game. I agree the events in GW2 were poorly implemented it felt like a backwards version of Rift's events to me. Story telling was easily the worst part of GW2, even though it had numerous other faults. At least in relation to leveling.
Hahahah I love this man, Viadric.
Every day he is posting how much he dislikes ESO and many others bash him for doing it.
Now he makes a post asking opinions about ESO and suddenly the same persons who were criticize him, are giving him opinions, forgetting they have bashed him before.
I love both Viadric and this forum
Give it a rest, dude. Seriously. It's not the "fanboys" jumping on every single thread about other games and talking about their love for ESO. It's the haters jumping on the ESO threads trying to run the game down. Why not let the folks who enjoy the game have their forum to discuss it?
Anyway, to the OP: One word to describe this game: Refreshing. It's a mix of some of the strong points of GW2 (beautifully crafted world, minimalist combat design, emphasis on exploration, skills tied to weapon selection), SWTOR (great storyline and lore, fully voice acted), as well as the freedom to construct basically any class you want (TSW). Then, throw in some DAOC-style PvP and a deep, complex crafting system, and you've got the makings of a great game.
Having said that, I think they released it too early. Not sure if it was forced out the door like we see with so many other games, but it definitely needed a few more months in the oven. It's certainly in a playable state, but it's also a frustrating version of playable. Still a lot of bugs, broken quests, odd graphical glitches and immersive-killing issues with the phasing system. Not to mention some missing features (adventure zones) and some curious decisions on the part of Zenimax regarding other features (no Auction House + seriously exorbitant pricing on many mundane in-game items/services).
All in all, definitely worth the money. But it's also definitely not without its flaws.
Does it feel more singleplayer or multiplayer? Well, because you know SWTOR.
I'd disagree with most of that. The dungeons I have done (1st 3) were boring. The 3rd of those was bugged (banished cells) so I can't really comment, but doesn't look promising. Public dungeons are a bit of a joke because they are overpopulated atm (no challenge, just wait for the zerg.) World Bosses are lulz. Sure you can't solo them, but they are not world bosses that I remember from WoW vanilla (see Azuregos or the other guy in the sound by sunken temple). Again wait for 2-3 players to help and its ez. No real strategy required. Dark anchors-- again no challenge and its boring.
There is a lot to do yes, but its pretty much dull and meaningless. Filling your map with icons that change from black to white is not exploring. Pretty much everyone's experience in any given zone will play out the same way.
Hits on all the elements depending on how you want to play (singleplayer, multiplayer and anti-social multiplayer) You can level to max level with quests just being solo, although I hear VR 6+ questing is hard. Or you can group and do the various instance dungeons, world bosses, public dungeons and dark anchors. The game fits both play styles.
The OP asked for people's opinion of the game, I gave my opinion. You don't have to agree or disagree with. But it is telling you got upset with my positive feedback. The first three dungeons are nothing special they teach you the basics of the game and are fairly short, but once I did the dungeons in the 30s not only are they beautiful and fun but they add new mechanics. Not to mention they can be long.
I don't think any game does leveling as good as ESO, this is if you like RPG elements in a MMO. It feels a lot better than what we have in the MMO market today in terms of leveling. I will go far as to say they nailed it.
I also forgot, ignoring all the leveling content. The progression system in the game adds to it. I keep switching my weapon playstyle depends on my mood. I go from Greatsword to Dual Wield to Destro Staff to Bow all the time. If keeps the combat engaging and refreshing.
I have played all the Elder Scrolls "alot" back to Daggerfall...
Was really looking forward to ESO and gave it a fair chance , but it really falls short in many many ways ....
Its a terrible representation of an Elder Scrolls game , and its a half baked MMO ... already uninstalled ans unsubbed ...
this one is not worth the price of admission ....imo
It definitely feels more more multiplayer than SWTOR because of the exploration factor. The zones are huge, the world is beautiful, and exploration is not only possible, it's pretty much mandatory due to the skill shards and the way the quest npcs are set up. You need quests to level up the most efficiently. And those quest givers aren't all sitting around hubs waiting to be talked to. You've got to go out and find them. SWTOR's linear map design is what killed that game's feeling of MMO.
Now, that being said, I'll say this: The phasing in this game prevents it from being a true multi-player experience. Once you get into the quest chains, you really do feel as though you are playing a single-player ES game. You still see players running around, but you are kind of on your own unless you can find someone on the same exact step of the quest.
Also, unlike SWTOR the best story-telling aspect of this game is NOT the central storyline. That is pretty horrible, unlike the SWTOR class stories. It's linear as hell and really generic. Almost feels tacked on. It's the world/zone story arc as well as the side quest story arcs that are the best in this game.
Disagree. And filling in your map with icons is not what exploration is about. You've managed to short-sell the game, particularly the exploration part, quite well in your post.