Am I allowed to say...

KillerJimmy

Am I allowed to say I'm not in the beta for LOTR? Since I haven't signed an NDA on MMORPG.com or over at LOTR I would think it would be allowed. So here goes: I am not in the LOTR beta! I have so little interest in the game that I'm not sure I ever applied to be in the beta. Turbine can look to DDO if they wonder about my lack of interest in their games. After DDO, the burden of proof [of a quality game] is on them.

Next time you post an insulting reply to one of my posts, how about you read what I'm saying in the post and the thread? I'm a professional developer, I have signed many NDAs and, to the best of my knowledge, have never broken one. I have gone so far as not bringing any requested example of my work to a second interview because it was all protected under an NDA (I still got the job ). I have worked on small teams trying to get a new idea to market many times (with extreme personal investment), so to say I don't understand NDAs is pretty presumtuous. Having said that, I really doubt 90% of these games bring anything new to the table, but I still understand the desire/legal need for the NDA.

As I was saying though, if there was ever an NDA that didn't allow you to even say you were in a beta I would fail to see the value of that. Restrictions like that or an NDA that is never lifted until the release of a product all throw red flags to me due to passed experience. Most of us have enough experience to know something [bad] is up when a company goes into lock down of information.

So then: why did you delete my post again?

Aetherfang

Yeah, I agree completely, when I made this same point I was surrounded with about 30 idiotic fanboi's and Fangurls that i nearly crapped myself, then someone who wa smaking the same point as me got banned by some self rightous admin, fun fun, this community is just getting better and better....

Jackdog

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Originally posted by Aetherfang 
this community is just getting better and better....

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the commmunity willl get a lot worse after release when all the WoW kiddies drop their subscriptions to WoW and run over to LoTRO

RK-Mara

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Originally posted by Aetherfang
 this community is just getting better and better....

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If you are taking MMORPG.com site as the community. Real communities are on lotro-europe.com and lotro.turbine.com.

Like Jackdog said the community will get much worse after the release, when more people will find their way to those sites. That's why I'm trying to enjoy european pre-launch community as much as I can.

whitedelight

Just from my ow n personal experience , four PC MMOs(I know is not considered a lot by many standards), the pre release community is usually filled with more mature fans and less trolls for all MMO discussion boards. Even though LOTRO will bring many "kiddies" from the WoW community over I believe they will get simply filtered out over time. For one WoW is a great first MMO, good game to break into the MMO realm with. You level fast, is easy to aquire items, and pvp is extremely short, most battles of 1v1 being over within twenty seconds. Please do not give me the whole WoW is not as easy of a game as you are making it out to be. There are sites and videos you can watch about "Naked Troll Project" where a player created a troll and only equipped him with weapons to get to 60, and do his end game raiding. Not many games would let you pull off such a feat. Children are turned off by the grind to get to high levels. From a site that was linked on the official boards for this game the writer stated that levels 1-20 went by fine and easy and after that the grind factor started kicking in. Also, with the current pvp set up there will be the players who cry that MPvP is not truly pvp, and over time will drop their subscription as well. To get off my rambling, the comunity will weave itself out over time and people will go back to their respective MMOs while the true fans and people who enjoy this gameplay will stay. Can't wait to see you all there! ^_^

xIMPx

WoW has nothing to worry about, trust me.

Moirae

Killer, Turbine has a fit is you break the NDA by even saying you're in beta. You may not like that, but it's still the truth.

Ryowulf

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Originally posted by Jackdog
Originally posted by Aetherfang 
this community is just getting better and better....

the
commmunity willl get a lot worse after release when all the WoW kiddies
drop their subscriptions to WoW and run over to LoTRO

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No
it won't. How many 'kiddies' do you like are deep into LotR? Lotro
isn't the only game coming out and the others will appeal much more to
WoW players than this game.



Also I feel word of mouth will be mild about this game. I don't think
you will get a lot of shouts in open beta about how great the game is
base on the reviews and posts. Add to the fact that no game can live up
to the books or even the movies, which will mean that an average game
is going to come off as much worse to disapointed fans.

Jori

I believe the "kiddies" they are speaking of are probably the ones that watched the movies but might not have read the books. The ones who imagine themselves as Legolas, Aragorn or Gandlalf...heh, or Legoles, Legolaas, Legollas, etc. I've seen that name in so many forms on so many MMOs, I'm starting to forget the original spelling.

admriker4

well ive played the game and i didnt sign any beta. Ive seen it at two game conventions, one was E3 and the other had it at a sci-fi convention. I actually got 15 min of it at E3.

My impressions...

First thing comes to mind, a clone of WoW and not a very good one. Some of the functions were intuitive but others were bad. It took me asking a dev how to equip stuff before i could switch out gear.

Second, combat is just boring as hell. Take WoW but make the animations really uninspiring and you have LOTR. It made me NOT want to fight anything as it just wasnt fun.

3rd, i didnt see any interesting mobs. It was the same old tired dogs, bugs, and bad buys out there...boring.

4th, the world is very small..much smaller than WoW.

Finally, it didnt feel at all like Middle Earth. Some may say "but dude your a hobbit" sorry but it didnt feel that way. Hobbit, dwarf, all the same feel to me. Not once did I feel like I was ever in Middle Earth. The names were there but the adventure wasnt. The quests are the same old boring crap, go kill 6 dogs, go collect 5 wood piles garbage.

Turbine blew another one im afraid. This game plain sucks. I already cancelled my pre-order

KillerJimmy

That's good to know. I guess they should have made everyone at trade shows sign the NDA too. If you're going to hide a stinker of a game, why not go all out? lol

If it's anything like DDO, they will release a demo and I will download it and play it for one evening and then uninstall it forever. What a flop that game was! Like I've said: it is now on Turbine to prove they can make a good game, there are no allowances after DDO.

Elda

admriker that's quite something you're saying for having played the game only 15 minutes.

the world may seem small but they will bring out more parts of the whole map after release. In the end I think it will be bigger the WoW (so just start playing the game half a year after launch )

From what I've seen the game looks quite like it should be, especially the shire really made me feel like I was running around in the books or the movies.

admriker4

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Originally posted by Elda
admriker that's quite something you're saying for having played the game only 15 minutes.

the world may seem small but they will bring out more parts of the whole map after release. In the end I think it will be bigger the WoW (so just start playing the game half a year after launch )

From what I've seen the game looks quite like it should be, especially the shire really made me feel like I was running around in the books or the movies.

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First of all, I played for only 15 minutes but I watched others play for an hr or more. Plus I watched a dev later on show off some stuff. One of the devs made a toon at lvl 20 with loads of gold and items and let someone play it so I got to see more than the newb areas.

And the world didnt seem small, fact is it WAS small. Very small in fact. And you state they will bring out more maps after release. Well thats all speculation. I doubt turbine will make expansions with new areas if the game flops badly. And based on what I saw and chatter from others who got to demo the game, a flop is a very real possibility.

Believe what you want, but I got first-hand knowledge of the game and it was very disappointing to me.  Factor in Turbine's extremely dismal track record for MMO's. Add those two up and most logical folks will believe what Im telling you...turbine blew another IP im sorry to say. It doesnt give me pleasure to state that. I wanted this game to be a big hit and give me a home for years to come. But sadly the game is really very very bad. Somehow Turbine didnt learn a thing from the DDO fiasco.

 

Athela

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Originally posted by admriker4

well ive played the game and i didnt sign any beta. Ive seen it at two game conventions, one was E3 and the other had it at a sci-fi convention. I actually got 15 min of it at E3.
My impressions...
First thing comes to mind, a clone of WoW and not a very good one. Some of the functions were intuitive but others were bad. It took me asking a dev how to equip stuff before i could switch out gear.
Second, combat is just boring as hell. Take WoW but make the animations really uninspiring and you have LOTR. It made me NOT want to fight anything as it just wasnt fun.
3rd, i didnt see any interesting mobs. It was the same old tired dogs, bugs, and bad buys out there...boring.
4th, the world is very small..much smaller than WoW.
Finally, it didnt feel at all like Middle Earth. Some may say "but dude your a hobbit" sorry but it didnt feel that way. Hobbit, dwarf, all the same feel to me. Not once did I feel like I was ever in Middle Earth. The names were there but the adventure wasnt. The quests are the same old boring crap, go kill 6 dogs, go collect 5 wood piles garbage.
Turbine blew another one im afraid. This game plain sucks. I already cancelled my pre-order

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Well, agreed you could get an impression on how the controls work, and what combat is like during a short tryout, but I don't see how you can judge the entire game, and the world size etc from such a small sampling. 

Also, since the game has a spring (?) release of 2007, I would think alot would change by the time the game releases.  I'd hang onto those hobbit shoes if I were you.

carlosjuero

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Originally posted by admriker4
well ive played the game and i didnt sign any beta. Ive seen it at two game conventions, one was E3 and the other had it at a sci-fi convention. I actually got 15 min of it at E3. My impressions... First thing comes to mind, a clone of WoW and not a very good one. Some of the functions were intuitive but others were bad. It took me asking a dev how to equip stuff before i could switch out gear. Second, combat is just boring as hell. Take WoW but make the animations really uninspiring and you have LOTR. It made me NOT want to fight anything as it just wasnt fun. 3rd, i didnt see any interesting mobs. It was the same old tired dogs, bugs, and bad buys out there...boring. 4th, the world is very small..much smaller than WoW. Finally, it didnt feel at all like Middle Earth. Some may say "but dude your a hobbit" sorry but it didnt feel that way. Hobbit, dwarf, all the same feel to me. Not once did I feel like I was ever in Middle Earth. The names were there but the adventure wasnt. The quests are the same old boring crap, go kill 6 dogs, go collect 5 wood piles garbage. Turbine blew another one im afraid. This game plain sucks. I already cancelled my pre-order

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The thing is that you played something that was ready at that particular time. Whose to say that most of those things you didn't like haven't changed already? Seeing as how there are still months of Beta left to go it is kind of early, in my opinion, to be drawing any sort of conclusion about what the final product will be.

Moirae

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Originally posted by carlosjuero
Originally posted by admriker4
well ive played the game and i didnt sign any beta. Ive seen it at two game conventions, one was E3 and the other had it at a sci-fi convention. I actually got 15 min of it at E3. My impressions... First thing comes to mind, a clone of WoW and not a very good one. Some of the functions were intuitive but others were bad. It took me asking a dev how to equip stuff before i could switch out gear. Second, combat is just boring as hell. Take WoW but make the animations really uninspiring and you have LOTR. It made me NOT want to fight anything as it just wasnt fun. 3rd, i didnt see any interesting mobs. It was the same old tired dogs, bugs, and bad buys out there...boring. 4th, the world is very small..much smaller than WoW. Finally, it didnt feel at all like Middle Earth. Some may say "but dude your a hobbit" sorry but it didnt feel that way. Hobbit, dwarf, all the same feel to me. Not once did I feel like I was ever in Middle Earth. The names were there but the adventure wasnt. The quests are the same old boring crap, go kill 6 dogs, go collect 5 wood piles garbage. Turbine blew another one im afraid. This game plain sucks. I already cancelled my pre-order

The thing is that you played something that was ready at that particular time. Whose to say that most of those things you didn't like haven't changed already? Seeing as how there are still months of Beta left to go it is kind of early, in my opinion, to be drawing any sort of conclusion about what the final product will be.

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Who are you kidding? No game does a complete about face when they have such a small time before release. Early beta or not, the game isn't going to completely change. If it has the WoW feel now, it will have the WoW feel later. There just probably won't be as many bugs.

admriker4

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Originally posted by Athela



Originally posted by admriker4

well ive played the game and i didnt sign any beta. Ive seen it at two game conventions, one was E3 and the other had it at a sci-fi convention. I actually got 15 min of it at E3.
My impressions...
First thing comes to mind, a clone of WoW and not a very good one. Some of the functions were intuitive but others were bad. It took me asking a dev how to equip stuff before i could switch out gear.
Second, combat is just boring as hell. Take WoW but make the animations really uninspiring and you have LOTR. It made me NOT want to fight anything as it just wasnt fun.
3rd, i didnt see any interesting mobs. It was the same old tired dogs, bugs, and bad buys out there...boring.
4th, the world is very small..much smaller than WoW.
Finally, it didnt feel at all like Middle Earth. Some may say "but dude your a hobbit" sorry but it didnt feel that way. Hobbit, dwarf, all the same feel to me. Not once did I feel like I was ever in Middle Earth. The names were there but the adventure wasnt. The quests are the same old boring crap, go kill 6 dogs, go collect 5 wood piles garbage.
Turbine blew another one im afraid. This game plain sucks. I already cancelled my pre-order

Well, agreed you could get an impression on how the controls work, and what combat is like during a short tryout, but I don't see how you can judge the entire game, and the world size etc from such a small sampling. 

Also, since the game has a spring (?) release of 2007, I would think alot would change by the time the game releases.  I'd hang onto those hobbit shoes if I were you.

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Its been my experience that what you see in beta is pretty much what you'll get at launch. Beta is just to test things and server loads, etc but you arent going to see a major overhaul.

Ive played in beta for SWG, DAoC, CoH, WoW, Auto Assault, EQ2, AC2, Matrix, Face of Mankind, Horizons, Roma Victor, and probably a few others Im forgetting as well. Not one of those games had any signifigant changes from beta to launch. They tweaked a few abilities and added a few player requests but otherwise beta was all about slowly adding in some content and bug fixes.

You can hope for a miracle I suppose but look at turbine's track record. If DDO didnt teach them a lesson, then nothing will.