To be honest, it sounds like this early review only covers the first 10 levels. This game continues to grow after that. Those 10 levels are just a warmup session - the public quests, scenarios, and open rvr get more complex as the game progresses. I am repeatedly and consistently blown away by this game. I was not looking forward to it, as I am typically not much for pvp (I applied for the beta, because, hey, it's what I do), but this game - wow - I don't even know where to begin. It is not without flaws or bugs, but for this long-time veteran from the days of muds, this is the best massive yet. If I can pull myself away, I'll write a more formal opinion and review so those of you who want to know more about the actual mechanics will have something to read.
I don't consider myself a fanboi but I had the most fun I've had in ever in a mmo for the past 2 weeks in war - blows wow out of the water imho - I cant even play the 3 other mmo's I had subscriptions to (even deleted them from my harddrive) just cannot get into them after the fast paced constant action of war -
That said I did some PQ (love them) but from lv 2 - 21 prior to preview weekend and then again to 20 in pw i did most of my time in war in pvp of some sort, be it scenario or the world objectives and was not bored once
There are some minor bugs but I've played Every mmo in that list on the left except for like 5 or 6 and it is in way better state than many of them even this much later.
Will my other half, my 2 best friends and their spouses buy it? yep we all did ce-preorder and do not regret it at all. I have a beefy system and during the cb I had a crash every few hours but I did not crash once during the pw weekend. I'd like the graphics slider options to increase the detail of character models but other than that and pathing (which has been addressed) I have not much bad to say.
I was too busy to take screenshots but the healer classes are all great to play - each actually contributes to pve AND rvr in a good way and have some forms of damage - cc is almost non existant which is great and the longest someone can "stealth" is 20 seconds once every minute or 2 so stealth zergs are not an issue. Once you are past lv 10 gear really isnt that big of an issue either because the steps in gear are like 2.5% better per incriment which is not bad and unlike wow, everyone can get the gear fairly regularly so its not like you will always have someone with omg leet gear giving you no chance whatsoever - unless you are lazy and dumb (you can be casual though)
The world is in tiers (1-4 basically with the "cities" being tier 5)
each racial pairing has its own areas and each tier's area is 2 zones or so with tier 4 being 3 or 4 (cant remember the actual zone numbers)
Elf/dark elf
chaos/order
greenskin/dwarf
and they all have their own feel the chaos/order ones were the most popular in pw beta.
they are fairly big and they all contain a central "pvp" region ie, you walk across an invisible line and get the message "you are entering a pvp area blah blah" these are well defined but not in an "immersion breaking" way once you are in there you are "boosted" to the average level for that regeion, for example, if you are lv 12 and go to a tier 2 rvr area you get boosted to lv 18 stats.
There are more and more rvr objectives as you go up in tier as well. And PQ's get better.
Scenarios are cool (my favorite lowby one is kain's wrath - you run around capturing 2 "flag posts" and once you own both it blows them up killing everyone that doesnt get out of range fast enough (even the people that set it off) but not the game determining "fun" for me - they are a nice interlude and good for quick action when you want it.
I played both order and destruction (will be a runepriest in release and have a sorc and brightwizard alts) and both were fun and their areas convincing. The chaos/order tier 1 zone seemed like the best for action due to the fact that it is set up around a town and you have great battles there.
Well I got wordy unintentionally and I'ms ure its a mess to read but if you did, hope it was useful:P
Originally posted by Synjyn Why write up a review of a game you have hardly played. No information here.
Ummm.... Because these are "first impressions" and not a review maybe?
Anyway, I enjoy reading first impressions because it is those first few days in-game that can make or break a game for me. Many of the trial periods for MMOs I have tried have won me over totally or turned me off from a particular game forever.
Trial periods won me over completely to Guild Wars and LOTRO -- and yet showed me that certain other games (Tabula Rasa, CoH, etc.) were just not worth it.
So, thanks for posting these first impressions!
As it happens, while I am interested in reading *about* Warhammer Online, it is a game, like Age of Conan before it, that just does not interest me personally. I like story-centered games, and Warhammer sounds very much like WoW in that regard: a killing-, leveling-, gear-based game spread out over a paper-thin "story" backdrop. No real objective or substance to it beyond that. Thus, Warhammer Online, from what I have read thus far, sounds like something I'd get bored of pretty quickly. It seems to be technically very good but to have no real heart to it.
I'll be interested to see whether future reviews give me any incentive to actually try this game, but so far ... yawn. Maybe, at some point down the road once WAR is offering free trials, I might give it a go. But with Mines of Moria coming out this fall, Warhammer is barely a blip on my radar screen.
Set your expectations low, very low and wait at least 6 months and maybe you won't freak out about the quality of the game.
But honestly aren't we all a bit tired of paying for unfinished games. Not in the, "oh it just needs some time to polish out the bugs" but in the missing 4 classes and 4 capital cities kind of way.
I guess I'm a little disappointed. They couldn't find somebody who actually had time to play the game? The five qualifier sentences at the beginning basically said "I didn't really play all that much, but it was one of my assignments, so here goes..."
Comments
I enjoyed the article, but I have developed my own opinion by playing the game. I like it.
Good game and a Good company
They work at it, they want it be good, so they have put as much effort into it as possible...
Worth the money to see it, test it, and decide for yourself.
Don't go just by the reviews.
Why can't the reviewer talk more about the game? Instead of what they think about it.
I want to know whats actually in the thing so i can decide whether I want to buy it.
Would it kill for some screen shots? Or aren't you allowed to post any? How about a low res movie of some combat.
Looking forward to the future reviews.
To be honest, it sounds like this early review only covers the first 10 levels. This game continues to grow after that. Those 10 levels are just a warmup session - the public quests, scenarios, and open rvr get more complex as the game progresses. I am repeatedly and consistently blown away by this game. I was not looking forward to it, as I am typically not much for pvp (I applied for the beta, because, hey, it's what I do), but this game - wow - I don't even know where to begin. It is not without flaws or bugs, but for this long-time veteran from the days of muds, this is the best massive yet. If I can pull myself away, I'll write a more formal opinion and review so those of you who want to know more about the actual mechanics will have something to read.
I don't consider myself a fanboi but I had the most fun I've had in ever in a mmo for the past 2 weeks in war - blows wow out of the water imho - I cant even play the 3 other mmo's I had subscriptions to (even deleted them from my harddrive) just cannot get into them after the fast paced constant action of war -
That said I did some PQ (love them) but from lv 2 - 21 prior to preview weekend and then again to 20 in pw i did most of my time in war in pvp of some sort, be it scenario or the world objectives and was not bored once
There are some minor bugs but I've played Every mmo in that list on the left except for like 5 or 6 and it is in way better state than many of them even this much later.
Will my other half, my 2 best friends and their spouses buy it? yep we all did ce-preorder and do not regret it at all. I have a beefy system and during the cb I had a crash every few hours but I did not crash once during the pw weekend. I'd like the graphics slider options to increase the detail of character models but other than that and pathing (which has been addressed) I have not much bad to say.
I was too busy to take screenshots but the healer classes are all great to play - each actually contributes to pve AND rvr in a good way and have some forms of damage - cc is almost non existant which is great and the longest someone can "stealth" is 20 seconds once every minute or 2 so stealth zergs are not an issue. Once you are past lv 10 gear really isnt that big of an issue either because the steps in gear are like 2.5% better per incriment which is not bad and unlike wow, everyone can get the gear fairly regularly so its not like you will always have someone with omg leet gear giving you no chance whatsoever - unless you are lazy and dumb (you can be casual though)
The world is in tiers (1-4 basically with the "cities" being tier 5)
each racial pairing has its own areas and each tier's area is 2 zones or so with tier 4 being 3 or 4 (cant remember the actual zone numbers)
Elf/dark elf
chaos/order
greenskin/dwarf
and they all have their own feel the chaos/order ones were the most popular in pw beta.
they are fairly big and they all contain a central "pvp" region ie, you walk across an invisible line and get the message "you are entering a pvp area blah blah" these are well defined but not in an "immersion breaking" way once you are in there you are "boosted" to the average level for that regeion, for example, if you are lv 12 and go to a tier 2 rvr area you get boosted to lv 18 stats.
There are more and more rvr objectives as you go up in tier as well. And PQ's get better.
Scenarios are cool (my favorite lowby one is kain's wrath - you run around capturing 2 "flag posts" and once you own both it blows them up killing everyone that doesnt get out of range fast enough (even the people that set it off) but not the game determining "fun" for me - they are a nice interlude and good for quick action when you want it.
I played both order and destruction (will be a runepriest in release and have a sorc and brightwizard alts) and both were fun and their areas convincing. The chaos/order tier 1 zone seemed like the best for action due to the fact that it is set up around a town and you have great battles there.
Well I got wordy unintentionally and I'ms ure its a mess to read but if you did, hope it was useful:P
Why write up a review of a game you have hardly played. No information here.
Ummm.... Because these are "first impressions" and not a review maybe?
Anyway, I enjoy reading first impressions because it is those first few days in-game that can make or break a game for me. Many of the trial periods for MMOs I have tried have won me over totally or turned me off from a particular game forever.
Trial periods won me over completely to Guild Wars and LOTRO -- and yet showed me that certain other games (Tabula Rasa, CoH, etc.) were just not worth it.
So, thanks for posting these first impressions!
As it happens, while I am interested in reading *about* Warhammer Online, it is a game, like Age of Conan before it, that just does not interest me personally. I like story-centered games, and Warhammer sounds very much like WoW in that regard: a killing-, leveling-, gear-based game spread out over a paper-thin "story" backdrop. No real objective or substance to it beyond that. Thus, Warhammer Online, from what I have read thus far, sounds like something I'd get bored of pretty quickly. It seems to be technically very good but to have no real heart to it.
I'll be interested to see whether future reviews give me any incentive to actually try this game, but so far ... yawn. Maybe, at some point down the road once WAR is offering free trials, I might give it a go. But with Mines of Moria coming out this fall, Warhammer is barely a blip on my radar screen.
Set your expectations low, very low and wait at least 6 months and maybe you won't freak out about the quality of the game.
But honestly aren't we all a bit tired of paying for unfinished games. Not in the, "oh it just needs some time to polish out the bugs" but in the missing 4 classes and 4 capital cities kind of way.
I guess I'm a little disappointed. They couldn't find somebody who actually had time to play the game? The five qualifier sentences at the beginning basically said "I didn't really play all that much, but it was one of my assignments, so here goes..."