It seems that every game coming our way also comes with both hope and fear attached. With Neverwinter, one of the year's most anticipated titles, that Catch 22 of emotion reigns supreme. In our latest Neverwinter column, we take a look at those things that cause us to tremble both with joy and fright. Read on and then leave your thoughts in the comments.

Neverwinter is, as is every game these days, something that makes us cautiously optimistic. It seems that many of us were bitten by the hype bug last year and were subject to fits of the vapors at the mere mention of our favorite title. Invariably, however, those same games that caused us to swoon with delight before release, ended up being a disappointment in one fashion or another. I won’t name names but you definitely know the games I’m talking about. 

Read more of Suzie Ford's Neverwinter: Hope & Fear All at Once.

How are we supposed to support a game when we haven't palyed it for a bit to see if it's worth it.

I smell something wrong here

I think it should work both ways. It's fine to monotize your game, it's also wise to provide a subscription option that allows full access to everything. if a "cash shop" is just that with nothing but cosmetics, then having a subsciption so players can avoid being limited and locked out of certain features without having to be nickel and dimed, is a great way for those loyal enough to a game to commit 15 dollars a month.

The "Fear" of many developers are, if they provide a subscription option, then they can't impose gates within the game that literaly force you to have to pay in some way to progress. players who see only F2P (many of them not all) will avoid such a game, even a large IP.

Another thing is, even though the industry is really wanting to completely do away with the sub/monthly model, it's still viewed by many, that a game without it  (at least as a option) was designed to steal your wallet and was designed poorly.

"GW2" hype > "Neverwinter" hype

Do not even compare. Please.

To Cryptic games:

Fool me once (STO), shame on you. Fool me twice......   erm.... well you ain't gonna fool me again.

Cryptic, IMO, is the worst MMO company ever created. Their games and marketing ploys are garbage.

$60 bucks to play a beta...  lol.

They did a similar thing with Star Trek Online. Before anyone was able to play it, they were selling a playable Borg race (only obtained with lifetime subscription purchase) for over $200.00. The offer expired when beta started...  probably because they knew nobody would buy it after playing it.

Terrible company.

I'm sticking to my guns on this one. I'm not even going to look into Neverwinter. If it's Cryptic, I know it will suck.

I dont know how you can say that Cryptic has only sided on the vanity side of monitization.  In STO you can buy ships with special powers and transfer those systems to other ships and stack them giving your ship a huge advantage, is that not the very definition of P2Win?

I will be holding off from this one until I see some reviews.  If there are any kind of lockboxes, I wont be touching this one.

'Thus far, Cryptic and publisher Perfect World Entertainment, have sided with the ‘vanity items’ only type of monetization.'

Did you actually every do any research for this puff piece or is this just a nice tie in with the advertising splashed all over this site?

Perfect World and Cryptic have pretty much never just sold vanity items.  From the ship unlock in STO, (which was superior to any other in the game at the time), through to the questionite unlocks and vechicles, (which are needed for the latest content and can only be obtained random from a lockbox from the CS), in CO, Cryptic and PW have a long history of nickel and diming anything they can.

I liked NWN1 and had some fun with it.  I wouldn't expect any new MMO based on the IP to be exactly like it and would give any other compnay a chance but not Cryptic. They had a shite rep before PW came along, (anyone remember patchgate and paying extra for bug fixes?), and honestly looking over the way they handled the game they have it only seems to have got worse .

I know they've paid you well but you can only fool people for so long before they wake up.  In these guys case they don't deserve any more chances.

I see no Hope or Fear, just Sorrow that such a terrible company was given such an awesome IP to destroy. You would think their mishandling of Star Trek would have scared everyone away, but you can never underestimate stupidity.

On the bright side....the decision to NOT buy is pretty easy.

The game looks pretty good given that it's just heading into beta in a week or so.

Since the game is action / reticule based combat, that needs to be good.  It really needs to be Tera good (not terribad).  I think Tera has set a standard in that department and pure action games will likely be measured against that.

The preorder pack seems a bit spendy to me.  It does have some goodies in it though and could be decent enough if you're a hardcore fan of D&D and the IP.  The gems in the founders pack are:

• 12 slot bag per character
• 750,000 Astral Diamonds (analogous to Dilithium in STO)
• 3 addtional character slots (total of 5)
• Immediate Foundry access
• mount
• pet

Spider Mount

Originally posted by Torvaldr

 

I'll still get to play a couple beta weekends because I bought Torchlight 2.  So there will be a chance to check it out.  I'm pretty stoked about the game, but I don't really have any expectations on what it's supposed to deliver.

does the beta access count if i bought TL2 on steam? or is it limited to purchases through PWE website?