Character creation seems pretty important in a game that doesn't have any real reason to make alts in.

Originally posted by eluldor

Originally posted by remyburke

My other major problem with TSW is the total and utter lack of immersion. The world is plagued by SWTOR's issue: it's made of lifeless cardboard.

Wow, haven't seen somebody point that out yet. There are actually npcs walking around in London, and when you click on npcs they respond. SWTOR = no. Day / Night cycles are in TSW, SWTOR = no. Weather like dense fog in TSW, SWTOR = consistant weather effect, rain always there, move two feet = no rain.There are not all sorts of npcs wandering around in the wilderness, but I wouldn't expect that with all the monsters out there. I don't see them comparing, and played SWTOR all the way through on both factions. Been in TSW CB for a good time.

I was speaking more on the art direction and level design. The world is very claustrophobic and the characters all seem dead behind the eyes. It's apparent immediately that I'm playing a videogame, and not walking around in a living, breathing world. I prefer my games to look and feel more like DayZ, Skyrim, Vanguard, etc., but that's just personal preference of course.

Originally posted by ShakyMo
Gotta take issue with the lifeless world like swtor. It's nothing like as plastic as swtor.

Mobs aren't rooted the spot they move around
Day night cycles
Ambient sounds
Npcs that actually talk to each other
Mobs that attack rival mobs
Various criters
Weather

Could go on.

I don't think it's necessarily as bad as SWTOR, but it's not particularly immersive. The story is immersive, heck even some of the cutscenes are interesting though you just stand there watching it. But story driven content has a limited lifespan.

I appreciate that some of this is simply a matter of opinion and taste, but in my experience:

1) The majority of mobs do not move, or if they move it is within a very narrow patrol range. I don't believe that I saw any NPCs move in the entire game all the way through the first part of Transylvania. Some of the large mobs do pat in a big range, there were some of these guys in Egypt, but that's about it.

2 & 3) Yes, there are day and night cycles and I think the sound in the game is very good

4) NPCs do have a limited vocal script, but then again, they are also in the same coffee shop or record store or office for eternity. The same cars are always in the same spot on the same street. The same people are always found at the same place talking about the same thing waiting to be activated by the player to get your repeatable quest. They could do better.

5) I did see mobs fight eachother on occasion but it was not a major component of gameplay.

And yes, there were critters. If there was weather I didn't notice it having much of an impact or even being memorable.

At any rate, soon many people will see and judge for themselves. Maybe the world will feel more "alive" with a bunch of people running around in it. Or maybe players will deliver their own RP in places like the stage in London, who knows.

Originally posted by ShakyMo
Oh wow the two things swtor has over tsw.

Choices that don't make any difference, backed with game mechanics which encourage you to go all goodie or all baddie on them choices.

And "myself" talking in a jarring American accent. I mean mute pc killed skyrim and half life 2 didn't it.

LOL

It could be that a mute character is the way to go for more of a "free World" seemingness to it, im not saying its horrible. its just wierd sometimes when your in a cutscene that is getting deep and shits going on emotionly and your just kinda staring blankly or nodding your head in response.

Well, I'm giving it a try outta pure boredom. Been playing EQ2 on and off for entirely to long. So I need something new.

Play beta 3 & 4. But since i have limited play time, I will stick on SWTOR.

Originally posted by remyburke

I was speaking more on the art direction and level design. The world is very claustrophobic and the characters all seem dead behind the eyes. It's apparent immediately that I'm playing a videogame, and not walking around in a living, breathing world. I prefer my games to look and feel more like DayZ, Skyrim, Vanguard, etc., but that's just personal preference of course.

Understood,  for me GW2 appealed better in that direction. Both games are better when I compare to my SWTOR experiences though.

What are the game controls like? Are they like WoW? WASD and two-button mouse run options?

Thanks!

Be Smart wait 2 or 3 months.

i'd say the boring combat broke it for me..

with a small world coming in second.

For me it is the only game with something new in this year and i will buy it when winter comes. Finally rpg with real rpg quests.

I think the biggest game breaker here is the combat is extremely dull and mindless.  It's basically based on spamming a resource builder then using a consumer.  In EVERY build.  A little more creativity and fun going into the combat would have went a long way.

The game does make good use of what the combat system for what it is.  Things are well balanced, there is a good sense of progression, instances feel like they are at a good difficulty, etc., but the combat itself leaves much to be desired.

I'm still going to be playing the game till GW2 comes out and I consider 2 months of hardcore play a good value for the money.  It says a lot about the games other redeeming qualities when I find something as critical as combat poor, but still enjoy the game.  Still the combat was enough to turn off a lot of people in my community chapter (GW2) who may have enjoyed playing the game in the interim if the combat was better.

Well...here, game writers previews and pretty much anywere Ive looked everyone notices the combat and animations to be subpar. I think Funcom has a good idea of what to work on.

Originally posted by Hexrunner

Unfortunately, what I saw in the beta weekends was an abundance of people that didn't want to spend any time thinking through some of the missions and wanted all their answers handed to them on a platter. Then there were people obliging them by shouting out the answers in the general chat. I'm hoping that will tone down somewhat.

GMs have already let it know during the Beta Weekends that they'll treat Puzzle Quest spoilers as Harrassment and that folks will be looking at bans for performing them.

I've heard that one chap did get banned during Beta Weekend 3 for doing that, even though he'd been warned about the penalty.

Now giving hints is considered fine, but the actual answers. That's supposed to be limited to PMs only.

Originally posted by Theocritus

 Game breaking issues for me in TSW:

4) Replayability - Because the game is so story driven and the quests are one and done type fo quests, there really is zero replayability....Also the factions all look alike and have the same clothing options so what's the point?

Actually, there are also Faction Quests and Faction specific Clothing. (Unfortunately, my char was bugged during the Beta Weekends, so couldn't get the Faction Quests, and thus access to the Faction Clothing. Then again, I rather liked my leather trench coat, military sweater, jeans and punk boots look.)

Examples, the Illuminati Illusionist, Dragon Warlock and Templar Warlock decks all use Hammers and Chaos Magic, yet their looks are drastically different.

Same goes for the Illuminati Thaumaturge, Dragon Wu and Templer Exorcist decks, who are Blood Magic and Fist specialists.

Although how each deck interacts with their specific skills is different. An Exorcist is a healer for instance. While a Wu is a dotter, whereas the Thaumaturge is more of a debuffer and exploiter.

Originally posted by eric_w66

"players won’t have to run back to the quest giver to get the reward. This is a game set in the modern era and players will receive quest rewards via PDA, a really nice touch."

Heh. 'Won't have to'. I like that spin they put on it. Yes, yes, you WILL have to run back to the quest giver. Many times. They even admitted to *why* they did it this way: If they let you gather up your quests all at once, they'd have to slow down xp gain because you'd run out of content too quickly. So to "add content" they make you run back and forth over and over and over again to slow you down. Fantastic. This will probably kill the game faster for most people more than anything else.

Pause a quest because you know you'll never probably be in this out of the way secluded hard to reach spot again and there's a quest item laying on the ground (some idol, etc)? Yeah, you can "dial in the reward" for that new one, but you get to run back to where you got the one you paused to get it restarted. Apparently, your quest giver KNOWS when you've put them on the back burner, and won't let you "Dial" that one in, they want to see your FACE when you beg them to let you restarted their mission.

 

Simple solution to that, always keep an empty slot open for one of the grey item quests.

Also considering how close some of the Quest giving NPC's are to the vendors, it's not that bad having to go back to them, means you can empty out your Inv at the same time.

Additionally, most quest ends will end up a hop and a skip away from a new quests as well, so finish one, go pick up another one. So the full quest list is not nearly as dramatic as you make it appear.

Plus you can always place a personal marker on your map, reminding you where the quest is, so you can head back out there on another occassion. Some of the mobs in those distant areas drop some pretty decent loot as well. So there's another excuse to go out into the boonies. :P

Having said all of this, I do expect this game to end up as a niche one. If what I've seen during the Beta Weekends is any indication, then it's far too cerebral for most players, and even the simplest of puzzles that shouldn't take you more than 5 minutes, folks had problems with.

Heck, reading a book and then following the instructions within, was far too hard for some folks as well. And then they kept of crying that their quest was bugged, whereas it was just them not paying any attention to the clues given in the world.

Too many; "oh I found those cutscenes boring and escaped through them" peeps as well. While it's pretty much a fundamental rule for this game, DO NOT skip the cutscenes, they contains clues and hints as to what you're supposed to do next.

And if I weren't on a budget, then this game would definitely be a must buy, in my estimation.

PvP.

It' is a make or break feature nowdays for all mmo's.

Not enough or too much, pve/pvp balance.

It's a hard thing to get right, & getting it wrong costs subs, just look at swtor.

I find it funny when people keep saying the conbat is dull and mindless simply because they don't get it. Going by descriptions here you'd think it takes 10 mins to defeat a mob. This game is just too complex for most mmo gamers as it stands now. It's really funny because it keeps getting compared to GW2 whose combat minus some improvements is the same system seen in mmo's for years. That is why funcom remains a niche company they will try to bring out something different when everyone wants more of the same. 

The popular gamer notion is that developers have about a half hour to make the case for their games before players will either love or hate it. 

Hah...the popular gamer notion is actually this is about how long most sites or mags wait before writing up a review for a game. Yourself included.  Which is pretty much spot on

Originally posted by nuttob

I went into the betas thinking I would wait for FTP if it ever came along, but I was so impressed that I lifetime subbed. [...]

Same here, but my conclusion was ill probably wont play it even after it goes FTP. Just cant stand the combat system.

I don't like the article, the people saying it is being to positive are right, you are giving them the doubt o n all the items on the edge. Don't get me wrong, I have preordered it and was very happy with what I played during the last 3 beta weekends. But to be fair, things like Character Creation and some of the animations are flawed and look cheap, no point in arguing about it.

However, for some players those things are much less important than others and the positives outshine the uglies on this one by far. At least from my personal perspective.

What MAKES it for me:

- it is the first MMO in a long time that feels fresh to me, all the other games invoked the been there done that feeling, no matter how polished they where (tried Rift, TOR, Aion in the lst year)

- I don't feel like I need to rush to the maxlevel to participate in the endgame, I hate to always compare how far are other players and oh, they are raiding already I'm only halfway there. Here the conversion from vertical to horizontal leveling is much smoother and the lack of raid content takes away that mental preasure. This goes in combination with the next point.

- Exploration is rewared, the playfields are huge and full of details worth to explore (thanks to the unusal but very well though through questing system). You find quests, lore, and hints for the investigations all around. I feel more free here despite the loading screens, than in other games that have a seemless world but questhubs with shopping lists.

- Skillsystem is deep and fun to explore, certain mobs (even questmobs, sometimes need special builds)

- I am German, living in Asia: One Server, I can play with everyone in the world, only one server, thats a huge huge plus for me, can play with friends I played multiple games in multiple regions with

But yeah, there are BREAKS:

- CC is not up to 2012 standard, one model per gender, no heigh, weighth sliders. Crappy selection of hair choices, limited in length because they coulnd't get the clipping fixed. Please, that whould have been weak 5 years ago.

- Animations are a mixd bag, some are good, some are bad, but there is no feel of hits actually connecting, this makes the combat feel a bit bland

- not as polished as it could be, there are questbugs and technical issues still present (as of BW4) and players will run into them. Bit disappointed bout this, but nothing really gamebreaking (except maybe the equipment manager that is unable to save sets correctly)

In Summary, no point in talking away the flaws, but I think a lot of players see the shiny side much brighter like I do.

Sigh... way too many caviats and 'rating a feature under the assumption that it will improve by a certain amount post launch'.

If you feel like that's necessary I'd rather see write-ups like this wait until such a change has already happened.