I'm enjoying the game for some strange reason....

Rejor

 Personally, I think one of the reasons I like this game is the first person view. It's actually very immersive.

I also like how I was able to be a soldier of the Emperor, although I don't like the fact that I didn't have the choice of staying as a soldier, even if others viewed that as evil :P

Anyways... yes the game is a grind. Come to think of it though, every MMO is a grind in some form. The Diplomacy feature is really cool, especially if you like stories. I've spent most of my time being a diplomat Although I do hope that I can one day become a soldier for the Emperor again.

As far as roleplaying goes on the RP server, it's allright. It's nothing like it was in old-school Star Wars or UO, since you can't just walk into a tavern and start talking with people. In fact, I think that's one of my main gripes, is the fact that no one ever talks in /say, only in /shout. Couple that with the fact that most of the RPers there seem to be hypocritical (only use /shout for important messages, not RP! Oh but wait, there never IS any important messages!)) and so on and so forth, the RP is somewhat lackluster for the time being. Those tiems I DID get into good RP though were excellent, especially since my char's on the side of power, and the Emperor, which many seem to view as bad.

The bugs are crappy, sure. But the only major one I've found was the mob-dissapearing bug. That's more of an annoyance than a threat though, at least so far. The lag could use some work as well. As far as graphics, they really need to work on that. On my 1 gig ram, 3.4 ghz X800 ATI card rig, it chugs a bit when I enter cities. However, it's not that bad, considering other things I've played. Most of that chugging is due to hard-drive access, but once everything's loaded, the FPS really isnt' bad. I run on balanced settings btw.

To be honest though, the bugs and lag really isn't as bad as it sounds. Then again, I've played UO when it first came out, and that was lag hell and buggy as crazy in the first several months (back when 56k was the BEST for about a year, and cable/dsl was just starting to come out) So, when it comes to bugs and lag, I'm pretty leniat I guess. Others who have gotten used to better launches in the past few years will think otherwise though.

The quests are actually pretty decent, although one-sided for my quest line. I forget what the race is called, but it's the asian-looking race (tharsian I think?) At one point it seems like the story SHOULD branch, but it really doesnt'. Needless to say, at this point the quest lines seem a bit unfinished... I wanted to go the side of power, but was basically forced to follow the side of 'good.'

Ah well.

I can't really say much for crafting, I've never really gotten into it. I'm not much of a crafter. Adventuring is pretty good, I play in first person view, and I love how you are actually part of the action... the sword swinging, your kicks, everything.

However, I don't know if I'll stay past a month or two. It all depends on how it improves.