1) Was G&H a well-made MMO, and did it have unique features?

2) Did it play just like WoW?

3) Was the ancient Rome setting immersive?

4) Did PE treat players right?

5) was gameplay exciting?

6) how about the graphics and sound

7) was G&H on a level of quality with leading MMORPGs?

You may ask what G&H has to do with STO? I think it has a great deal to do with.

A) PE has 2 games on its roster. It's first failed. STO is its sole title now.

B) PE described G&H as a AAA MMO many times.

C) PE misled gamers and the press about its layoffs.

D) Gaming Companies tend to release games similar in quality and style, and G&H should be the same for PE, especially since its such a small company and being developed together

Isn't this the startrek forum

Originally posted by TheOracle1

1) Was G&H a well-made MMO, and did it have unique features?

I believe that it had some unique features but I also feel it had some very big flaws

2) Did it play just like WoW?

No

3) Was the ancient Rome setting immersive?

Yes it was particulaurly immersive the npcs were fun to talk to and you felt the world... however just seeing hulking monster beasts running around everywhere was kinda odd...

4) Did PE treat players right?

Yea i had no complaints about the company i feel they honestly did try but the game just wasn't there.

5) was gameplay exciting?

No. It was fun to see those cool special moves where you were picked up or tossed ot stabbed through but besides that it was just another click attack and wait game... exepct everything was very ... well SLOW

6) how about the graphics and sound

Graphics were pretty poor in my oppinion I feel alot more could have been done in this department i could never make a char who looked good.

7) was G&H on a level of quality with leading MMORPGs?

No Everything felt slow walking running jumping it all felt like I was sufering FPS drop... but i wasn't...

 

I did enjoy my time in G+H but it was just i feel not competitive. It had some very good points to it but the mechanics of movement and control just bogged it down for me. Everything felt like i was walking through molasses or something. But PE had no part in that persay that was the game it self not devolpment or costumer support.

 

 And to atach this to STO. I don't feel that GH's lack of zoom and success has any Relevance to STO's possibility for success Many times companies have made horrible games and have mad great ones near each other. Every company has its Hits and misses. Not only that but just because a game is PRODUCED by the same company does not mean that it is using the same teams OR company of game makers to get it into fruition.

STO will be a different game it's of a tottally different Ilk all together and i am Still 100% excited for it from what i've heard about it. GH's cancelation deffinitly made me go OH NOES but i am by no means Condeming STO just because of it. To do that would be just... wrong and very un gamerish.

Originally posted by TheOracle1

1) Was G&H a well-made MMO, and did it have unique features?

2) Did it play just like WoW?

3) Was the ancient Rome setting immersive?

4) Did PE treat players right?

5) was gameplay exciting?

6) how about the graphics and sound

7) was G&H on a level of quality with leading MMORPGs?

 

You may ask what G&H has to do with STO? I think it has a great deal to do with.

A) PE has 2 games on its roster. It's first failed. STO is its sole title now.

B) PE described G&H as a AAA MMO many times.

C) PE misled gamers and the press about its layoffs.

D) Gaming Companies tend to release games similar in quality and style, and G&H should be the same for PE, especially since its such a small company and being developed together

 

 

 

1. Unique features....mhm the minion system was kind of unique. But nothing very special. Well made MMO....i would say, yes. I allways had the impression, that the devs thought about what they were doing.

2. Yes. As far as i played. First Quest: Go to that guy over there, lol^^ It played like WoW...and LotRO, Vanguard, and almost every other fantasy MMO.

3. The setting did not appeal me personally. But nice Questtexts, scripted Szenes and so on. For people aho like the Rome setting, probable yes.

4. Dont know what you mean exactly.  Support perhaps? GREAT.  If i compare with WoW for instance. I had several problems, contacted the Support, got very good, very personal, very proffesional answers. Also ingame after every Quest you were able to fill out a little summary. How was the Q? Fun? Too long/short? etc. The whole support/ticket system was very good, and integrated in the website. I was really impressed. Compared with other games, very good imo.

5. Exciting...a few moments were "exciting", ...it was fun overall.

6.Graphics...totally fine for me. Sound/music not so good imo.  Sometimes missing and...ah...sound/music is more important than many think, if its well made you dont notice it, otherwise you do ;)

7. It had many bugs and was clearly not finished. I cant say how the quality would have been, if they would have finished it. But i will not compare GnH in its closed beta status with games that are out for months or years. Thats nonsens.

I personally dont like the Rome setting, so i would most likely not have buyed it. But the beta was a great chance to have a look at how PE works and handles things. Esspeacially the support/backend part.

But this is not what you want to hear, is it? You want to hear "GnH is the worst game i ever played, PE Support sucks" or not? This is just another thread which purpose is it, to bash Pe or not?

If i am wrong, what is your intention with this thread? You already KNOW STO will fail, so why this thread?

I'm going to keep this REAL brief. I'll go in to detail at a later date.

1) Was G&H a well-made MMO, and did it have unique features?  For an early beta it was ok, for a game that was said to be complete and only needed polish, it was not. I don't consider the minion feature unique because Guild Wars and City of Villains have already done that. But the Greek gods feature was something a little different.

2) Did it play just like WoW? No it did not. Because of the minions, it played more like a clumsy Guild Wars.

3) Was the ancient Rome setting immersive? The architecture was nice as well as some avatars of the Roman Legion. The vegetation looked cartoony next to realistic buildings and avatars.

4) Did PE treat players right? No comment. I had no contact with customer support in-game.

5) was game-play exciting? No

6) how about the graphics and sound? I witnessed numerous graphical errors. As for sound, limited and inconsistent.

7) was G&H on a level of quality with leading MMORPGs? With regard to its beta status, it was not as stable or as playable as LotRO closed beta.

I went to the G&H Forums and picked up a few critical quotes about that game and PE. This is only sample of many more. The Pro-PE statements over there were few and far between.

Apparently we didn't beta test the same game. I found the task(quest) driven experience design to be very WoW like. I was very disappointed considering the historical possibilities of the Roman theme. And another game with the stupid icons floating over questgivers heads, not original at all.- SamuraiSword

One thing though, when I played beta (when they sent lots and lots of keys from fileplanet)...well, the beta was like a desert, barely anyone was even playing. I played about a week and could hardly find anyone, so I made a new character and only saw 2 or 3 other people in the starter area. They did keep sending me email wanting me to come back. So they were having problems getting players playing the beta. It was a bad sign for release. A shame too because it had potential. -Vendayn

LOL the beta was a mess and the game overall sucked. It was going to fail, they knew it, they went with the game that has name recognition but in my opinion will fail also. These guys are very incompetent to be honest.  Also the mythology roman theme, there is almost no market for it apart from a few Roma Victor type players.  Definetly too small a market to base a multi million dollar project on.- Airspell


But, they at least release 50-75% done..

GnH feels 25% done...and will fail...just watch...

Cheers! (10-6-07)

i agree this game is bleh.-Nakuma (10-5-07)

From what I saw in beta, the game was going no where fast.-centriko

I did the G&H beta as well, though only briefly, I couldnt bring myself to log in. Everything from the gameplay to the art direction was bland and uninspired.-spooytooth

Anyone that feels bad that this game has failed...don't.  I played the beta and it was a terrible game.  Just be happy that you didn't waste your money on it at release. -Keygan

The one thing I want to emphasize is the size of the game world, because I believe that since the founders of PE influence the game philosophy of anything within their company, STO could suffer the same fate.

I'll bullet-point the list to make it easier to read.

• The world was very small with no more than 11 or so zones
• All the zones were instanced
• All of the zones I saw had areas that channeled and restricted your movement with obstructions
• All of the zones were small and could be crossed in under 5 minutes on foot.
• Roma (Capital city Rome) was a small zone with non-functioning key features (Circus Maximus/Colosseum)

Its because of my experience in G&H that I believe that PE will use the same design philosophy on STO, very small instanced areas with geographical and man made obstructions channeling your movement along prescribed paths, much like some single player games.

Also of note, the lag, latency, server side crashes, and the multiple errors that caused endless CTD, made the game extremely difficult to test.

NOTE: The G&H MMO was run on the Perpetual Entertainment Platform (PEP) meaning that what gamers saw in the beta run is a good preview of what to expect from STO. To say otherwise is to be engaging in some kind type of spin, as PE is not going to undergo some kind of mystical revolution.

Originally posted by TheOracle1

NOTE: The G&H MMO was run on the Perpetual Entertainment Platform (PEP) meaning that what gamers saw in the beta run is a good preview of what to expect from STO. To say otherwise is to be engaging in some kind type of spin, as PE is not going to undergo some kind of mystical revolution.

Thats really bad because the UI (user interface) was extremely buggy and awkward.

The mission tracker was horrible. It was very difficult to keep track of mission progression, open mission goals or completed missions.

The other interface that was poorly designed and broken much of my time in beta was the chat interface.

For the Size of the world:

what you discribed could be the case in STO. Latest infos say, STO will be 25 sectors big at launch, mostly alpha and some beta quadrant, with about 10 "points of interest" in each sector, which could be Hubs, Questgivers, planets and what not.  Unfortunally there are afaik no hints so far how big one sector will be.

But otherwise PE could design the world quite big, and there would be no problems for traveling because of the transwarp gate system.

Personally i like smaller but therefore highly detailed worlds more than huge worlds with...nothing in it. Like for instance Dark and Ligtht.

Of course the best case is a huge and highly detailed world. We´ll see.

/EDIT:

The PEP has nothing to do with the user interface, which i personally think was not that bad, except the chatbox...bah.

PEP:http://www.perpetual.com/platform/

As far as i can tell from the accountmanagement/support part : well done :)

We will all just have to wait and see.

I can only judge them on their past performance and upon what I experienced in G&H beta.

Only time will tell now.

Originally posted by Keogh   

The one thing I want to emphasize is the size of the game world, because I believe that since the founders of PE influence the game philosophy of anything within their company, STO could suffer the same fate.

I concur, STO will be designed in a manner of "chasing the all mighty dollar."

Logically one would think that making a good  innovative game that people or fans of the IP in this case want to play and pay for... and keep paying for would be the way to go to make money.

Originally posted by DixonHill

The PEP has nothing to do with the user interface, which i personally think was not that bad, except the chatbox...bah.

PEP:http://www.perpetual.com/platform/

As far as i can tell from the accountmanagement/support part : well done :)

Bren

Originally posted by Brenelael

 

Originally posted by DixonHill

The PEP has nothing to do with the user interface, which i personally think was not that bad, except the chatbox...bah.

PEP:http://www.perpetual.com/platform/

As far as i can tell from the accountmanagement/support part : well done :)

Just to clear this up Dix is right. The PEP is just server back end tools and has nothing to do with the game engine itself. It all has to do with logins, account management and customer service. As far as we know this was all working just fine in G&H. All the serious bugs and flaws that I've heard of were  in the game engine itself and had nothing to do with the PEP.

 

 

Bren

That doesn't make my comment on the UI any less of a valid concern, because the same decison makers that control the company, and some of the same devs that worked on G&H are working on STO. And if I'm not mistaken, someone at STO had said at one time that STO would be using the same engine.

FYI: I did experience recuring login errors while attempting to launch G&H that would often result in CTD.

Originally posted by Keogh

 

Originally posted by Brenelael

 

Originally posted by DixonHill

The PEP has nothing to do with the user interface, which i personally think was not that bad, except the chatbox...bah.

PEP:http://www.perpetual.com/platform/

As far as i can tell from the accountmanagement/support part : well done :)

Just to clear this up Dix is right. The PEP is just server back end tools and has nothing to do with the game engine itself. It all has to do with logins, account management and customer service. As far as we know this was all working just fine in G&H. All the serious bugs and flaws that I've heard of were  in the game engine itself and had nothing to do with the PEP.

 

 

Bren

 

 

[That doesn't make my comment on the UI any less of a valid concern,...]

Nobody said it was :)

Btw, what does FYI and CTD mean?

FYI: For Your Information
CTD: Crash To Desktop

Originally posted by Keogh

 

Originally posted by Brenelael

 

Originally posted by DixonHill

The PEP has nothing to do with the user interface, which i personally think was not that bad, except the chatbox...bah.

PEP:http://www.perpetual.com/platform/

As far as i can tell from the accountmanagement/support part : well done :)

Just to clear this up Dix is right. The PEP is just server back end tools and has nothing to do with the game engine itself. It all has to do with logins, account management and customer service. As far as we know this was all working just fine in G&H. All the serious bugs and flaws that I've heard of were  in the game engine itself and had nothing to do with the PEP.

 

 

Bren

 

 

That doesn't make my comment on the UI any less of a valid concern, because the same decison makers that control the company, and some of the same devs that worked on G&H are working on STO. And if I'm not mistaken, someone at STO had said at one time that STO would be using the same engine.

FYI: I did experience recuring login errors while attempting to launch G&H that would often result in CTD.

 

Bren

Oh come on guys,...

GnH crashed for me aswell, and the launcher also and what not. So did WoW after 2 Years, and every other game, especially in beta. And yes, there were games which were more stable in beta. But that is hardly anything to worry about and not a valid "argument" in the overall "PE will fail" debate imo.

It seems like you are hopping on every single possible edge, just to find reasons contra PE. Its like "look they did a missspelling on their website!"

And i am not obsessively trying to defend PE, and i admit they have problems, GnH was not the uber game and things went wrong.

The most interesting bug I experienced was the disappearance of the entire city of Roma (which was it's own zone).

Yes, two days before PE shutdown the beta server for good, I entered the Roma zone and found absolutely not a single building or tree. There was only the texture covering the ground. You could see where buildings should have been from the cobblestone streets on the ground and the city layout in the mini-map.

I attempted to recalibrate my graphic setting and logged out and back in several times, but the city never appeared. It wasn't that I couldn't see the city. The city of Roma was not there, I could run straight through where the buildings should have been and I experienced no collision with any object.

There were no npc's or props in the area either.

The portals to exit and enter the zone were not visible or work either, so I was trapped in this "Twilight Zone" episode.

I logged back in the next day to find that a little more than half of the buildings and the city walls had reappeared, but no npc's or props.

That was my last experience before the server was shutdown for good.

Originally posted by Brenelael

 

Originally posted by DixonHill

The PEP has nothing to do with the user interface, which i personally think was not that bad, except the chatbox...bah.

PEP:http://www.perpetual.com/platform/

As far as i can tell from the accountmanagement/support part : well done :)

Just to clear this up Dix is right. The PEP is just server back end tools and has nothing to do with the game engine itself. It all has to do with logins, account management and customer service. As far as we know this was all working just fine in G&H. All the serious bugs and flaws that I've heard of were  in the game engine itself and had nothing to do with the PEP.

 

 

Bren

Additional Clarification with the PEP and the PGE:

As mentioned, the PEP is the described above; but Gods and Heroes was also using the PGE - Perpetual Game Engine. Link: http://www.perpetual.com/company/

A web search can made using "Perpetual Game Engine"...

So guess what people, what was experienced in Gods and Heroes, engine-wise may be experienced in STO... hope the engine is polished off by then.

GnH was garbage and I have no faith in PE as a company.  They had some good people working for them but the company as a whole I have ZERO faith in.  The game was junk and was boring as hell.  I followed the game for a very long time before it went into beta and was so dissappointed I just quit the Beta and the community.  At that point I figured even if the game did get released it was not going to be very good.  Thankfully I saw what was coming down the road, some didn't and invested a lot of time in a FAILURE.  STO fans beware, this isn't just a GnH failure, it's a PE company wide failure.  Hopefully they learn from their mistakes but management usually doesn't.  Their new investors told them to cut GnH and they bowed to their feet in a nano second.  I hope the talented people from PE leave and work for a company that's worth a damn. 

/rant

I was excited about this game for months, got into the beta and brought some friends with me. Because of server uptimes conflicting with my work hours, I didn't get a chance to play much, but my friends were telling me it wasn't going that good. Then, one day one of them commented how they were stuck in a wall. Couldn't move, couldn't die, could pull monsters over but couldn't get out of the spot he had fallen into. He sent both in-game, and forum mail to admins describing the problem. Next day, nothing, few days later, still nothing, still stuck in the wall.

It was about a week after getting stuck when he showed me the e-mail he got, explaining that he was now BANNED from the game for hacking. That's right...he found a bug that made a character unplayable, and they BANNED HIM FOR IT! All attempts to contact PE privately on his part and mine went unanswered, and any forum posts I made regarding it were removed near-immediately. Hell, I even tried to come on here and post somehting about it, and was warned about breaking NDA, of course.

Anyways, we all had a good laugh when the game tanked. We're hoping to get in the STO beta so we can watch it do the same. Here's a preemptive congratulations to PE for screwing up your next game too!

[/rant] (I know, I didn't use a starter tag, but I didn't intend to hate on them so much, and not quite sure where it started)

I like to know how a player can get Banned in a Beta, if the event was not offensive (such as spamming insults) or attacking the infrastructure (hacking code to gain information on accounts)?  Getting banned while finding or using an Exploit while in a testing environment...  isn't that what a testing environment is all about?

Oh by the gods, I better not try to find an exploit while in Beta, I could get banned...