I'd say go with that your friends have. Don't have any friends? Play WoW, it's more populated and makes it easier to make friends.

Seriously, an MMO is not fun without other people to play it with.

I just played Rift for about a month and I felt the PvE was more immersive (and less goofy) than WoW but PvP was surely lacking. Some warfronts, which seemed not as good as WoWs battlegrounds and certainly not as good as WARs scenarios and basically non existant world PvP.

So if you like PvP I would go with WoW. Myself I am playing AoC right now which atleast has some good old fashioned ganking on the new PvP server. :)

Two choices:

WoW

-Focus is more on cash shops over content

-Content updates every 6 months or 7

- server x-fers cost 25$

- constant excuses for why something is not possible...open world dynamic events...20 and 10 man being separate and not sharing the same lock out...smaller content made for single/duo casuals

-arena system

Rift:

-Content every 6-8 weeks..WoW fans will tell you quality over quantity, then go ahead and explain why they just had 2 hot fixes to fix gamebreaking issues

- no cash shops as of yet

- server transfers are free and Trion outright calls companies that charge for it in 2011 a rip off

- no excuses..we wanted Alternate advance and got it, we wanted smaller content and got chronicles...5 man teams wanted ways to get better gear and we got master modes...pvp'rs wanted altertive so they got alternate war fronts and pvp rifts

- no arena

I play Rift, so yes my opinion is biased on Rift, but I also played WoW for 2 years. In my view Blizzard does not use your sub money on WoW and it is widely known that alot of their top devs are on expansions and other projects not even associated with WoW.

lol....Dominos or pizza hut?

Originally posted by jonesing22

lol....Dominos or pizza hut?

It is not longer that honestly. Blizzard lives by raid or die. Trion has gone the EQ route where 20man raiding is still there and they do make it, but it is not the primary means of end game anymore. People who say it is are flat out lying.

If you are cool with finishing content in less then a month and being forced to do it for the next 6 go for WoW. It is no longer a case of being equal - WoW's engine is old or blizzard does not care anymore.

One way or another you are not getting your money's worth anymore playing WoW and 1.7 MILLION people agree with me when they quit. I'll predict it again WoW will take a much much heavier hit from SWTOR then Rift will.

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Originally posted by Puremallace

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Originally posted by jonesing22
lol....Dominos or pizza hut?

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It is not longer that honestly. Blizzard lives by raid or die. Trion has gone the EQ route where 20man raiding is still there and they do make it, but it is not the primary means of end game anymore. People who say it is are flat out lying.
 

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All people do in Rift is LFG queue and queue for the raids. Rifts are done sparingly and at lower levels not at all.

Most of the PvP people are about to bolt because of the Nerfhammer that's been swinging wildly over there. People are still reporting heavy waits for dungeons because the populations are dropping as evidenced by the shrinking servers still (closed some more down this past week), and higher level guilds are reporting problems keeping enough people because everyone is burning out on raiding.

Meanwhile, I'm looking at WoW commercials on Fox Television right now while watching NFL football, so you know there will always be people in WoW to play with. Loving Rift is one thing, but not realizing the reality is something completely different.

PopinJay, I'm sorry but you don't know what you are talking about. People are doing a lot in Rift besides LFG. Perhaps you tried a low pop server or didn't join a guild or whatever else may have happened, but your information is off base.

  There will be a lot of people playing WoW AND Rift for the foreseable future. Both games have their charms and simularities. Frankly, the main reason to choose Rift over WoW is that Rift has yet to charge for it's major content where with WoW you have to spend a LOT of money on expansions to play the current version of the game.

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Originally posted by huskie77
People are doing a lot in Rift besides LFG.
 

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This is what most people are doing in Rift on a daily basis:

1. Log in do dailies

2. Log in raid (if it's time)

3. Grind PA in EI

4. PvP in arenas (if they like PvP)

That's pretty much the daily routine most people do. Now you can say that's "a lot" but doing it, you won't think so. Now this is the stuff fans say people do as if it's really popular:

1. Artifacts

2. Title hunting

3. Exploration (in a small world)

4. Helping others

Most servers open world PvP is non-existent. Instant Adventures aren't even in the game and most people are burned out on those Chronicles already.

You probably should talk to a few more people because you'll find this to be the case, especially on the official forums when you read them. Why else are the servers still dropping off in population and servers shutdown?

Because of Santa?

The OP is obviously a wow fanboy, why even waste your time suggesting rift to him. I  would rate swtor and everquest 2 higher than wow and rift but thats just my opinion.

Go with the game thats not WOW. Always the right answer

Forget Both & Go Skyrim ...

WoW might be a bit over bright, but at least it does not look to me tepid and depressing like Rift, not to mention Rift feels very small and the world feels very artificial just built for the sake of leveling, while WoW has history for places all the way back to other Warcraft games and tons of lore that is a lot more easier to process.

If you disagree or dont care for graphics or lore, I'd still pick WoW over Rift because of the sheer size of WoW, they are very very similar games in how they feel when you are in the game, both technically working more or less very well, with the differences WoW feeling a bit more light hearted where Rift goes to the shades of grey in every aspect for good and worst, and the small size of Rift and artificial world feel all put together makes me vouch for WoW over Rift anyday.

Ofcourse if a person is completely done with WoW there might be a little something to do in Rift for a while, but I doubt it would last very long.

If the title is preferred to be fantasy, I'd wait for GW2, it has a lot similar third person gameplay but a lot of salt and spices on top of that, but I'm afraid that would be a very long wait, people who cannot wait for it are lucky if it's released 2012 at all. The state of the genre is such that there is not much to choose from if you cut off F2P's, WAR, Aion and Conan (and TOR).

Skyrim would propably feel awesome even if you dont like singleplayer titles but it's just that, a singleplayer title.

Neither for me. I'd play DCUO (F2P) until TOR comes out.

Both are bad.

Trion is better company though, so if really have to choose go with Rift.

Better avoid both though.

Trion is a better company and Rift is more massively-multiplayer and a game that has improved massively-multiplayer elements such as the open-world community-encouraged dynamic environment.

If one had to choose one, I'd go with Rift.

Ive played both. WoW for a couple years and rift for about 2 monthes. I personally enjoy rift more. i enjoy the graphics and the world events are fun. id go with rift.

Rift = WoW + Invasions/rifts - Arena 

Rift offers more in my opinion. Not more raids/dungeons/zones but more to do

Like say you can get together with a party go around zones doing different boss fights. These can range from 2 players to 20 players. 

I like getting currency and other useful things from closing rifts or stoping invasions. 

Crafting is pretty much the same, execpt what's nice about Rift's is if you're crafting gear, you can uncraft the gear and get some of the mats back. I know it's like that with enchanting/disenchanting in wow, but this how it is with armorsmithing and weaponsmithing, I imagine the other proffesions in rift also provide this. 

The world looks sooo much nicer. 

The world events are usually just a grind for a new mount or planar essence ( type of gear )

If you can afford it (since it is pricey to get started with everything since they don't sell a combo you have to buy everythings seperately except for vanilla and BC) go with wow.  Why would you want the cheap knock off (Rift) if you can afford the Rolex?  I don't like either one of them anymore, but I'd rather go with the original than the counterfeit any day.  

Originally posted by Cik_Asalin

Trion is a better company and Rift is more massively-multiplayer and a game that has improved massively-multiplayer elements such as the open-world community-encouraged dynamic environment.

 

If one had to choose one, I'd go with Rift.

Rift is the opposite of Massively Multiplayer, unless you consider glorified lobby games to be that.  WoW is far more of a massive multiplayer game than Rift, and has a ton more content.  

To the OP, choose WoW unless you like more freedom in customizing your character's abilities, etc.  In that case, I'd go with Rift.  WoW is superior in every other aspect but deep customization.

WoW has a lot more content and polish id say, although truthfully im only going off what i have heard about Rift. I hear Rift is pretty cheap nowadays, but if you've never played WoW before you can pick up the original and the first expansion for $5 at Blizzards online store and the other expansions have dropped in price significantly aswell. Seems SW:TOR is putting Blizzard on edge.