Well I can relate to the author as far as the EVE learning curve goes, and the sheer frustration of trying to "get it".  My character must be about 4 years old now and I've rejoined and left the game more times than I can remember.  I've never got to the stage where I felt like I was finally progressing or having fun.  I'm certainly glad he did and it makes me want to try again.

 Planetside was initially supposed to be a very different game as well, with many more mmo elements than the game that was released.  However, it was awesome until SOE improved it with mechs, much later on.

Stargate might still end up being a wicked game!

I've been back to SWG to try the new NGE on several occasions - SOE occasionally reactivate my account.  I hate it.  Playing it makes me angry because I remember what it used to be like and now all that's left is this bastard version.

I don't mind that there's a steep leveling curve tbh.  I try to view a game as a game rather than as a job to do.  I'll just continue to play casually and enjoy it while I do it.

I also use Macs for gaming.  People don't seem to realize that they are actually PCs nowadays.  Bootcamp isn't really a program - it's a boot manager to load Windows instead of OS X.

There's a lot of ignorance about Macs and I was one of the ignorant until last year when I finally bought one to see what all the fuss was about.

As for the mouse issue - Pick your own gaming mouse, as you would on your PC.  You wouldn't use the mouse that came bundled free with your PC - you'd choose a nice Razor or something.  That's what I did on my Mac.

The reason City of Heroes runs slow is because it uses Transgaming's Cider to make the game run which is just a Wine port like CrossOver.  I'm not a fan.  I think Wine is pretty damn slow compared to native ports like World of Warcraft and I wish game companies would stop using it.  They should design their games with cross platform in mind - Not just for Macs but for Linux, XBox 360, PlayStation 3 or any other equipment that's up for the job.

Microsoft Vista was such a horrid thing to release on PC users that it drove many of us to other operating systems to preserve our sanity.  Thankfully Windows 7 seems to be more on the money.

Blizzard have always supported Macs natively and WoW runs like a dream in OS X.  Shame I don't like WoW any more lol.

Planetside was awesome...  I'm going to check out Wurm Online.

I do often ask myself if I've just outgrown mmos in general.  I think I have to a certain extent, but there is also a lot more childish behavior around in mmos nowadays than there was and that's simply a fact.  It's one of the biggest turn-offs for me.  At least in UO you could murder annoying people!

I agree with the OP.  Things should have progressed way further than this by now.  There are tonnes of games to play for people that want instant gratification, but I used to think that mmos were more like a fantasy life simulator - true virtual worlds.  Now they're mostly just the same repeated junk.  I've been playing Aion and it's getting very grindy now, more-so than fun.

I remember eagerly awaiting Ultima Online 2 and was bitterly disappointed when it was cancelled, but I thought someone would come up with something similar soon enough.  They haven't.

Hey we like the aussies

Yeah we do but I don't know if they like us pommys much lol.

Originally posted by Rabenwolf

Originally posted by arcana666

Originally posted by Talinguard

 Almost every game has filters, just use um...

 

I've thought about this a lot and I don't believe that's a workable solution.  Besides any ignore list limit (10 in WoW I think?), if you filter the chat yourself then that's just you doing it.  It still doesn't encourage other people to go to cities and taverns to meet up and do business, and largely just gives you a reputation for being ignorant.  You'll also never get a group unless you participate in these global telepathic communities.

I know I'll be in a minority about this but it's my personal bug-bear.

 

Not ignore, but filter. Two different things. Example: Filter off general chat when playing unless you need to ask something.

Yes, I realize that but the effect is the same.  It would just be me personally choosing to not the see the messages and wouldn't encourage people to hang around in social locations nor make me seem any less ignorant!

Originally posted by Talinguard

 Almost every game has filters, just use um...

I've thought about this a lot and I don't believe that's a workable solution.  Besides any ignore list limit (10 in WoW I think?), if you filter the chat yourself then that's just you doing it.  It still doesn't encourage other people to go to cities and taverns to meet up and do business, and largely just gives you a reputation for being ignorant.  You'll also never get a group unless you participate in these global telepathic communities.

I know I'll be in a minority about this but it's my personal bug-bear.

The #1 thing that ruins immersion for me is the chat system. All modern MMOs have whispers and global / area-wide chat channels where everyone can communicate telepathically and every school kid can use it as their playground. UO didn't have this originally - restricted communication is something I really appreciate now that it's gone.

It also used to make cities more meaningful as people would naturally gather there in order to socialize, meet-up, and do business. It's all "new and improved" but imo it's most certainly not better.

Nowadays you can be alone, deep within a forest in the middle of the night. You kneel down to examine the deer's mutilated corpse. It's fresh and the beast that killed it must be close. Suddenly you hear a twig snap loudly behind you and you spin around to confront the....

Bumnugget whispers: "U HEEL?"
You reply: "Sorry busy atm"
Bumnugget whispers: "K"

.. werewolf. The first thing you notice are it's piercing yellow eyes which almost seem to glow in the darkness. Suddenly it crouches down to pounce and snarls loudly. You fumble...

[General Chat] Imtwelve: "anal [Ravage]"
[General Chat] ChickNurras: "anal [Backstab]"
[General Chat] Lolwut: "STFU"

... for your silver dagger. The werewolf leaps towards you. It's roar thundering through you, causing near-heart stopping panic, with it's sharp claws outstretched, glimmering in the moonlight.

Joe whispers: "Hey man. Work sucked today :("
You: ":("

Your hand closes over your dagger's hilt and you draw it and thrust outward in blind fear as the monster crashes in to you, it's huge body pinning you to the ground. You're aware your left shoulder is injured but it's still numb and you stab frantically with your right arm, burying the dagger in to it's ribs over and over.

Joe whispers: "Yeah. My boss is really getting on my nerves. He gave me a written warning for being late again."
Xdsfkljsdflkjsdf whispers: "Visit www.gold4mmostuff.com"
Xdsfkljsdflkjsdf whispers: "Visit www.gold4mmostuff.com"
Xdsfkljsdflkjsdf whispers: "Visit www.gold4mmostuff.com"
Xdsfkljsdflkjsdf whispers: "Visit www.gold4mmostuff.com"
[General Chat] ChickNurras: "anal [Rip]"
Bumnugget whispers: "U HEEL?"

/logout

I think it's the vocal minority that hate RMT, and that's exaggerated by most of the game publishers.  Personally I've never had a problem with people buying items, cash or even characters.  It doesn't affect my characters in the slightest.  I've never come across the mythical gold farmers in WoW that steal all the leather, herbs and mining nodes either - they're always contested anyway by regular players.

Gold selling spam... that really does get my goat which is why I wrote SpamMeNot for World of Warcraft.  tbh though WoW does a poor job at policing chat in general.  Kids can spam their "anal" and "dirge" stuff all day long and abuse the same people over the course of years with little punishment, if any.  That's certainly the case on the EU realms.

I managed to get hold of a chinese beta account for 1 day before it closed and I was pleasantly surprised.  It all feels polished and it's extremely beautiful and yet I still managed to get 140fps in most places.  I don't think it dropped below 40fps in any area.  It has the usual basic EQ / WoW formula (with extras like combos) but... well it's a much newer engine.  I know it's not ground-breakingly different to other MMORPGs out there but I'm going to buy this because...

1) It's very, very, very pretty.
2) You can fly and I love the whole angels / demons idea.
3) It feels finished before release (unlike SWG, Vanguard, Darkfall and others).
4) I just really enjoyed playing it and I'm actually frustrated that I can't play it right now.
 

Maybe I'm wrong but didn't EverQuest have like 430,000 subscribers in it's heyday?  By today's standards that might be considered low but they were the King of the Hill at the time.

Ref: www.beststuff.com/fromthewire/everquest-experiences-a-record-number-of-simultaneous-players.html

As a side-note, I'd prefer to play with 430K quality players than 12 million children with A.D.D. any day of the week.

Originally posted by cosy

is a pvp game and you have to understand very well how things works because you can lose stuff if you dont have the basic knowledge, city and city siege is one of them

also if i am a possible customer do i have to read interviews to find out details about a game or read it on game web page FAQ section ?

like i told you lack of communication skills (marketing ?)

btw yes slash commands are important i want to know how many things can be executed on that way is a easy "find" if the game is vulnerable to macros/bots

OMGZ I didn't get a full manual in any of the following betas that I took part in:

Asheron's Call
Anarchy Online
EverQuest II
World of Warcraft
WoW: Wrath of the Lich King
SWG: Jump to Lightspeed
Dungeons & Dragons Online

... that'll be because beta != release.  Yeah that is quite a few and yeah I bought a lot of them on ebay.  Anyway betas are release candidates not confirmed release versions.  Also if you open your original manual for your current favorite MMORPG, you'll also find it's hideously out of date because these games change all the time.  You're not going to get a full list of slash commands before release.  Indeed many released games have never produced a full list of slash commands.

It's like people have been looking over the shoulder of the devs since they typed their first line of code and screamed "ARE WE THAR YET?" every 5 seconds for 8 years.
 

The difference is Blizzard doesn't  play around, they just deliver the games. Which can't be said of a group of nerds that is small talking about their shitty eternally in production game since Bush still had a lot of popularity

Really?  Blizzard's Starcraft II was delayed in to 2008 and then in to Fall 2009.  I was in Paris when they unveiled Diablo III too - think that'll be delayed too?  Burning Crusade was also delayed.  I'm not complaining but it's perfectly normal for game companies to have setbacks, or indeed most software companies.  It's the nature of the beast.

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IPS include firewall. How come firewalls don't prevent DDoS attacks? Aventurine is wasting too much time discussing in their game forum rather than working on some useful thing.

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Just one reason (of many) of why a firewall may not help in a DDoS attack is that the attack could be as simple as making legit hhtp requests from multiple sources, over and over and exceeding the bandwidth capacity of the target. You can't firewall that without denying everyone access to your site.
 
 

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You are so far out of touch with reality on this one it is laughable. Really, technical DDOS squads of DF trolls working to keep the company down... are you serious?!?! Just glaze over the fact that if Aventurine had any security what so ever these attacks would not have been successful. A simple IPS system would have bypassed the past few days of pain for them at minimal cost. To lump forum critics in with criminals (DDOS is criminal) is simply idiotic.

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It's not far fetched to assume that people attacking a company don't like the company.  There's no such thing as a simple IPS system.  Firstly IPS stands for Intrusion Prevention System which will not help at all in a DDoS attack since no intruder has hacked into the servers.  DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks by definition use multiple sources to overrun the capacity of the target.  Yes it's criminal.  Do I think anyone here is responsible? I doubt it but I was pointing out that the Darkfall opposition in general is very strong - so strong that their website is being attacked by script kiddies.

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YES THEY ARE! Many of the hardcore fanbois on here are in fact saying DF is the best MMO ever. Anyone who even remotely hints at criticism is labelled a troll immediately no matter how valid their point might be. There are irrational people on both sides of the coin here... to only see one side shows your bias. You can say you are neutral in this matter but clearly your statements indicate otherwise.

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I didn't state I was neutral and neither have you.  In my opinion if Darkfall is as advertised then it will be the best MMORPG ever made... for me.  It won't be everyone's cup of tea.  Nobody can say it's awesome atm because we know very little about the final product and those that do know seem to be upholding their NDA.  I am biased in that I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.  I've not handed over any money and in that respect I don't feel like they owe me anything.

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Sorry, but a month out from release if they are actually serious about release this time would not give any company enough time to implement any of the core systems ALREADY LISTED ON THEIR WEBSITE! More to the point everything they are doing has been done before... there is nothing ground breaking in the game. If someone wanted to copy them it would have happened by now. This is a completely failed argument on why the NDA should remain u

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And yet there is not another modern 3D MMORPG in existance with the same features. Quite honestly the industry has been so lacking in innovation that anything that goes against the EQ / WoW formula should be considered ground-breaking.

Originally posted by fyerwall

No offense, but Tinfoil Hat much?

I highly doubt someone would go out of thier way to stop Aventurine from operating its webserver in the hope that it would prevent Darkfall from succeeding. I mean its plausable that some irate hater went insane and attempted to bring it down, but its also higly unlikely.

You just said you highly doubt someone would attack their servers and then said it's plausible.  It doesn't take a massive amount of skill to take a site down with a DDoS attack - it's probably just swamped with traffic from multiple sources.  Someone quite obviously did go out of their way.

The theory that Adventurine are faking it doesn't really stand up to scrutiny either since they're still posting their announcements via www.darkfallonline.com.  If you've spent any time on the official forums you'll know that updates happen so infrequently that it makes sod all difference.

Originally posted by mutantmagnet

 

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Originally posted by arcana666
They'll shut up and pretend it never happened.  People have been real asshats about this game in general.  Even now when people have been invited in to the trial they're doing denial of service attacks to try and screw things up.  It's pathetic.

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You're out of line here blanketing everyone who is negative against DF for being script kiddies.

 

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You're correct.  Not everyone in the war against Darkfall are running DDoS scripts against Adventurine's forums.  That's just the technical squads which are entirely different from the disinformation and the psychological warfare waged on forums such as this.  It may be wrong but in my mind I generally bundle them on the same side - the side that wants to see it fail.

Am I skeptical about Darkfall?  I'm skeptical of every MMORPG because we've been subjected to such complete crap excuses for games over the past few years.  The truth is that the "fanbois" here are not saying "OMFG Darkfall is the best game ever!" because they don't know that.  They're just excited about the possibility of finally having a decent MMORPG.  We've sure waited long enough for one!

Large companies have generally pandered to the vocal minority in games.  They probably spend more man hours sifting through idiotic keyboard spew on their forums than they do actually improving their games.  Their publishers push them in to releasing games that aren't ready or sometimes aren't even playable (Star Wars Galaxies, Vanguard, Age of Conan to name a few).  Having a big company make a game is most certainly NOT a recipe for success, so I'm happy to give the little company a try.

People keep bashing the NDA too.  They absolutely need the NDA.  It's not there to stop players from knowing cool stuff - it's there to stop their competition from knowing cool stuff.  Look how fast WoW implemented Achievements and Siege PvP based on what they learned from WAR beta.  Adventurine's best chance of success is to keep things as quiet as possible so that people like Blizzard don't take the best bits too early.