Well I am one of those guys that bought LOTRO because I had enough with the cookie cutter WOW experiance.  I will admit WOW was ok but it got stale because of whole slew of poorly managed things.  However we are not discussing WOW. 

When I first logged onto LOTRO I thought this game looks really cool.  Went through the newb area and it was a good experiance, but it rang as a copy of every other NEWB area I had ever being in, WOW, AO, SWG...etc.  So the game started out being a bit stale, however being a long time TURBINE game lover I decided to push myself a bit more.  Once out of the Newb area I ran into a beautiful world, graphically speaking however again not a sandbox style game, very Do x quest from here then they lead you to this town, which then gives you x quests which lead you to this area.  This got stale VERY quick because again we have being force fed this style of game for awhile, WOW is a perfect example.

So why did I really not like the game, or "hate" it?  Well simple really it is a cookie cutter game, if follows the standards of MMORPG's now.  Strip out that all the character look human, and all you really have is a WOW clone in game design.  I am sorry to say this but it is true, I am not saying its identicle but the overall design of the game makes me believe I am in WOW still.  There is no freedom in the game, everything has being preplanned, your path has being set from the day you make your character.  Your skills are no different then everyone elses, and this kills ALL MMORPG's in my mind right now.

Games that don't follow this overall design I think will last longer, and be overall a better experiance for someone.  I remember the first MMORPG that I played it was Asheron's Call.  Still to this day the best MMORPG that I have ever played, why?  The Newb zone in AC was a simple, "This is your character, here are his skills, this is how you interact with the environment. Ok get out and have fun."  Do I need to talk to any NPC's after that for quests?  Yes I do but is it required to level up?  Nope.  The game is a sandbox, if you don't want to do those quests head to the nearest portal get to a town that you like and just random kill things till you level.  If you want to take a quest go ahead, but you don't have too, they won't kill your character if you don't.  Also your character is differenet from every other character on the server, the skill system was revolutionary, and the stat system as well.  Equipment didn't make your character special, YOU did.  Now have I seen a game that can grab my attention as well as AC did back in the day, nope.  A few have come close, EVE online is not bad but to slow for my tastes.  Any of the current games out, nope, and that includes LOTRO.  In all honesty there is only one game on the horizon that looks like it will break the mold for MMORPG's, and that is The Chronicles of Spellborn.  I can't wait for that game.

Now if you ask me should you try out LOTRO, go for it, just because I didn't like it doesn't mean thousands of others can't look past these issues or just have never being subjected to the same style of games I have.  Maybe if they all played old school MMORPG's for a few months first they might have a different opinion of what is good and bad.  As for me, LOTRO is ranked very low on my list of games I have played.

To answer your question about Vista 64bit working with games.  I have had probably every version of windows installed on my current computer from XP 32 up, legitly.  I my system is not the best in the world but as far as I am concerned it is the minimum to run Vista 32 or 64.  Here it is...

Intel E6300

2Gig Memory

Nvidia 7950GT

I have finally decided on keeping Vista Ultimate x64 installed on my machine.  It runs everything I want to play.  I have had no issues as of the last 3 months finding drivers for anything, and the system is rock solid.  I guess the only problem I have had in the last while with games would be with command and conqour 3.  I install it but the icons don't show up anywhere and you can't run it from the executable, however if you download the latest patch and install it, then run the executable it works no problem.

I still play Counter Strike, CS:Source, HL 2, C&C3, WOW, EVE, The last 3 NFS games, Sims 2, NHL 07.  I used to have problems with a few programs but those are cleared up, Incredimail was a bad one but it is fixed now.

I hate to say it but I won't ever go back to XP, and I am not even using DX10 yet.  My system runs for me perfectly, and if anyone was to buy a computer with vista for the last year I would always use my machine as the template and say, "if you are not getting at least these specs, wait till it is available, don't buy a machine with Vista"  It wasn't untill about September computers in big box stores started running Vista at an acceptable rate in my opinion.  Working in Best Buy part time last year durning the Vista release made me realize Microshafts biggest problem was they released it to early, by about 6 months.  But what do you expect from them, they had to offset there losses in there videogame division, xbox - xbox 36, with gains somewhere else so investors don't get grumpy.

My opinion your machine will rock, if you want to know for sure go to Toms hardware page and look at the games you play, then match them up with there test results on video cards.  Then look at there system test specs, if your system is technically better then what they setup, and you can live with the Framerates they show with there system you will be quite happy with yours.

just my 2cents

OMG I loved this, "Naked Runs", hell I remember playing AC in the first week and not knowing anything about magic.  We thought we were doing good being able to kill level 15 shreths...LOL.  Making runs to Qulabar were like a death trap before we learnt about portals.  I remember the first time I saw a character opened portal, I clicked on it and was whisked away with my mule to a dungeon where I fell 100ft to start.  You all know where I was, I thought wow this is cool, I survived the fall because my mule was a previous character.  So I walked down the ramp a bit just to see, and I saw a UA attacking what looked like an insect and there were hundreds behind that one.  I was like, "COOL!!" untill one chased me back up the ramp, I quickly exited only to be greeted by 3 more outside that killed me very quickly.  I didn't even have time to see where I was on the map, so I had to ask around and found out I was at the BDC, and then I had to find a portal there. 

Man the times I had in that game, learning magic, taking on my first 100 Olthoi, meeting my first Tusker.  Oh yea and being the first Sword fighter on my server to take down a Diamond Golem the morning of the patch.  Took me 15 minutes, oh and we can't forget the White Bunny of doom, I still want to know where the holy hand grenade is in AC to kill that thing...LOL.

The times in AC were great, your character was original, it didn't matter what you did somewhere you were different from everyone around you.  One person would do the 10/100/10/100/10 type character but everyone would raise skills differently.  Truely a one of a kind MMORPG, and still one of the best.

What game have I played that comes close to AC, I have to say nothing.  I have played most of the big titles, but none come close.  I thought AO was cool but too many problems from beta to release to almost a year afterwards for me.  I would think the only MMORPG that seems like it might come close, but I won't know till it is released or I am in Beta will be "The Chronicals of Spellbourn".  I am not saying it will be a match but it might come close, it offers you true skill development which seems good so far.

We won't talk about the biggest joke to an AC1 player ever, the release of AC2.  Honestly I gave it a chance had 2 max level characters, a Lugi that set up turrets(can't remember class) and a human Mage.  In AC1 your character was defined by your skills, you skills allowed you to survive.  How many people who played AC1 remember going into a dungeon and dieing like 5 times and loseing everything.  Going back with a store bought weapon and a robe buffed by a nice mage, and retrieving all of your crap?  I do it happened to me constantly, I think by level 75 I had like 800 Deaths on one character...LOL.  AC2 and I have to say EVERY MMORPG out there, your success is dependent on your gear, not on your skills.  Side note the Rogue in WOW although powerful with starter weapons in PVP could not go into a high level instance and help kill Rag, In AC1 you could go into MOST dungons with nothing but your weapon and a robe and survive.  At least untill hollow weapons were introduced, then that got a bit dangerous.

So the short answer to the question, "What MMO Was/Is Better Than AC1?"  is Nothing touches it.

Ok I have being playing MMORPG's since the start of Asheron's call, I have being in numorus betas, and played into many games.  I have tried out alot of games but by no means all of them, however I would like to know what people feel of Free to Play games?

I personally have tried a few of them, and although they try real hard they seem to lack the luster of games you pay for.  Now don't get me wrong there are a few that I have paid for that I wish I could get my money back for, example RF Online(no offense), and Eve.  Each game that you play that is FTP seems to be buggy as heck, to cartoony or no updates really.  Maybe it is just me.

Games you pay for seem to have more updates, story lines advance, game problems get fixed, ALOT less bugs..etc.  I am not talking just about WOW, because I still feel blizzard has taken that game to a pathetic ending now and will start losing subscribers very soon unless something big is done.  I remember all of the bugs that were in AC to start and how each month a new story would emerge and bugs would dissapear and the game got better and better.  The same went for almost every game out there except SWG that game just went down hill right after you saw the introduction movie.

So my basic question is, how do you guys feel about FTP games vs Pay as you go?  Do you think they stack up and if so what ones really stick out so I might try them and change my mind?

Thanks.