Firstly, nice thread, good read. Hits home, real hard.

I played from the first hour (literally) of the first day (we got the game a little earlier in australia due to time differences and as soon as the servers came up we were on) until about December 2005.  From September 05 i pretty much quit but got drawn back in a few times until december when i sold my account.  I STILL didnt take WoW off my PC and the guy who bought my account used to get me to log on and grind with him to help him level one of his other characters on his orginal account, he now has level 60; hunter, rogue (mine) and druid and he's STILL loving it since joining on that first day with me.

Personally i think its a great great game with awesome graphics, great support and a beautiful world thats a pleasure to look at and run around in.  My first look off the dam in Loch Modan during the beta was breathtaking (especially when i leapt off it) and the first time i managed to climb to the spot height at the top of Iron Forge (gnomish airstrip) i was also pretty happy with myself and the view.  I loved the game but why then did i stop if not to break out of the addiction which i was quite happy dealing with?

I couldn't play endgame seriously... thats the main reason... actually its 80% of the reason why i quit playing.  I was an aussie playing on an american server and even to raid with one of the aussie guilds on lightbringer (or one of the oceana servers) i would have still been required several times a week for quite a few hours and i didn't have the time to put into that.. i have a girlfriend that's not made up of 1's and 0's (much to the confusion of some of my WoW mates who still think girls are hot night elves) and strangely (here comes the sarcasm which is due pretty much right about now) enough she dosn't understand why a guy would ignore her for hours upon hours on end when they havn't seen her all day because of work and then just want to play a computer game instead of (cough) eating dinner together (cough cough) or going out for drinks with friends or whatever else (personally we play basketball in the same mixed team amongst other activities).

So basically what im saying i guess..... is that i LOVE WOW and although i LOVE IT i just can't play it because it just DOES NOT cater for casual gamers.  You just arn't part of the "Team" you never get the "Items" that apparently make a good RPG character and it just dosn't seem like fun anymore... it's a crying shame.

if ANYONE can suggest a MMO thats populated by a shitload of casual players not hard core gamers then i'd be happy to know what it is...

have fun guys..

GoT

Have i got the right understanding here that POTBS isn't about leveling but more about buiding ones fleet/treasure up like Sid Miers pirates. Then when u reach a certain point it makes sense to divide the plunder, increasing your reputation as long as everyone gets a big cut, you get your own captains cut and then you technically hire a crew and start again?

Or is this a leveling game like most MMO's? Do you need certain levels to be able to sail certain ships? Or do u just need the crew and need them to be in good moods etc?

Either way this game is shaping up to be a great replacement game for those serious ones you just cant afford to play anymore if you're not a hard-core gamer?  Will i finally have something to play again? I hope so... i have my beta app in so hopefully i get picked for that too :)

hopefully we get some answers in this thread anyway...

catchyers..

GoT

ps: to answer the question about release date being this year? NO.. its set for June 07... so it'll make a nice end of tax year present for you :)

dude i think you're definetly right.

the only reason i didnt jump on the band wagon with POTBS quicker was because i thought it was an early working title for POTC and so i just ignored it then i read otherwise online and thought "omg.. this looks like sid miers pirates online" which hopefully is pretty close to what it is...... with the MMO aspect involved it looks to be the perfect thing for casual gamers and serious gamers allike.... it could get me back into games which i havn't played any of for almost a year now.

GoT

i dont think so.  i havn't really heard about anyone complaining about URU live yet?  anyway, these sim type and adventure type MMO's are still semi RPG in a fasion.  Remember RPG means "role playing game" which means you take a ROLE.  So taking the role as the creator of this solar system or whatever you want to call it is still role playing in a fashion.  there dosn't have to be leveling and spells and grinding.

GoT

This game sounds absolutely intriging. i didn't find out about it until reading the news alert in my email.

It sounds similar to a really early MMO that a friend of mine played, perhaps as early as 98 but i can't rightly remember.  It was around the time that Ultima Online was big.  In this other version of the space epic you got dumped randomly throughout the univerise at the start when u logged in (similar size universe to EVE).  Then you had to build up from scratch and eventually build a space station (once you'd reached space technology) which could then build you transport ships (to colonise other planets in your solor system), ships with hyperdrive (to get to other soloarsystems) and warships (yes, to attack other peoples systems, this whole game was PvP).  I originally thought EVE would be something akin to this but was dissapointed to find out it wasn't really. 

Galaxylife sounds intriging and closer to what i was hoping for, the casual gamers are not really catered for properly as yet due to the casual market being expected as a lower income then serious gaming, however i believe that we (casual gamers who were once serious gamers) may be infact the majority.  Especially in the near future once the market is flooded with MMO's, consoles and lots of pointless hack and slash and FPS games.  Once this age of gaming has come to a close i believe that casual and less stressful games such as galaxylife may take over and become very, very, very popular.

Good luck to the creators and please listen to what the people want (im sure you already are by the sound of it).

cheers,

Matt

I purchased a Zboard keyboard from the Blizzard website about a year and a half ago and used it up until i quit WoW.  So i've got the FPS and WoW special keyboards for it but what im hoping is that i can get a  PoTBS layout because Zboards are sweet for playing games and a pirates layout would be perfect as im pretty much a definite for playing it now and i'm hoping i get the beta test invite.

I'd love another zboard however as we have 2 computers here set up together and it'd be great if they both had zboards.

anyway... , game on!

yeah the barque was great but i mainly used a sloop and relied on my personal abilty to out sword fight any enemy captain quickly.  I like using the scatter shot to kill enemy troops for a while before boarding.

GoT

yeah i think it was all taken into account marginally but improved in later versions. So it depends which one you mainly played.  My uncle finished the c64 version at top rank "kings advisor" but i could never reach such heights.  I think it took much saving and much carefuly sailing, as dilly dallying out at sea too long sailing against terrible winds or with no winds the crew would starve and of course get angry.

what a fantastic game, cant wait for the MMO version, which looks to be the same, but expanded somewhat.

i used to choose charm because i wanted to get the hottest wife :) lol.

I wonder how close POTBS will be to Sid Miers awesome games.  I started with the c64 version too, i just can't really remember it much i was pretty young like still in primary school.

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Originally posted by Squal'Zell

you are making it sound like it would be like a single player game but in an MMO situation?

true i can start seing fleet battles and such the wise. (but pirates dont attack in fleets though) anyhow it looks like a promissing game and ill keep on reading the info

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Well all MMO's CAN be a single player game in an MMO situation cant they? leveling in WoW was when there was noone else around and i found the same in Eve, DDO AND Ragnarok.  I'm sure that all have that similarity.  I know what you're getting at im not trying to be rude or anything, its just hard to put across points on forums without coming across that way i think. Um.. how to put it... i think that you're right in a way and wrong in a way.  It is a very solo type game like most MMO's UNTIL (the integral word here i think) UNTIL you get to a part where its either a. important to have your guildies along or  b.  pvp action against another fleet.

Second paragraph of yours; yes you can imagine the fun you'd have with fleet battle  and even 1 on 1 battle is just as fun. Knowing when to switch to a scattershot load for your cannons to take out the crew on deck of the other ship can be inportant if you're running in to board, in which case the enemy captain can probably guess that's what you're doing and make haste to keep distance.  Or you can go for teh scattershot to make him run? make him THINK you're gonna board?   I'm not sure about real history but if fleet battles in history can be taken into account there were pirates with multiple ships.  If i remember correctly the LAST Sid Miers game had a segment in the back of the manual called "the top 10 pirates from history" and historical accounts of famous pirates.  A couple of them controlled small fleets, not too dangerous to the navy of course but very deadly to the regular pirate enemy (the rich fat merchantman vessels, sitting low in the water full of booty).  I think its more promising than most people think but once again you've gotta have either a LOVE for PIRATES or A NEED for something different to Orcs, giant spiders and roaches or spaceships mining asteroids and travelling through hyperspace.

its all in what you want i think but i'm happy to let people know what i think AT THEM MOMENT. i may end up eating my words instead of the Ships biscuit.  IF thats the case then the maggots will be better off.

GoT

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Originally posted by Squal'Zell

yeh im looking into that game pirates of the burning sea... only thing that kinda makes me look away is the feature that you are the shipwhen at sea.

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DONT let that make you look away, infact its the best and most unique part of the pirate game!!  You're a pirate in town with possibilities (and once again im drawing from the solo player version, but it just seems to be so similar) like sword fighting other pirates, meeting wenches, recruiting men, trading, fixing your ships and buying new ships.  Not to mention attacking towns with your men (maybe your guild in this instance? who knows)

When you're at SEA, you control your flagship and sail around (thats how it appears and how it WAS too) and then when u enter a battle u used to enter a RTS type version of the game where you'd tell all your ships in real time what to do.  For example you can have your two sloops on the attack with regular cannon whilst your frigate (the flag ship) is busy reloading all 51 guns for the kill!!!  OR maybe the sloops will be using grapeshot to destroy the sails only of the emeny flagship so that your slower frigate can actually close in and your crew can board.  In the solo version at this stage youd sword fight once again and this was one of the fun parts of the game.  U could then capture the ship instead of sinking it, take it to port and repair the sails and your army now numbers 4 ships :)  of course you'd get to keep some of the crew who usually leave their defeated sack of shit captain at first chance :) arrghh! to be a pirate with a very piratey crew.

Now this is speculation on my behalf as i've only JUST started getting into POTBS website and im reading all i can and a lot of this comes from the solo game.  Which was one of the best games ever made in a lot of peoples opinions. Maybe whilst your waiting you should run out and grab it "sid miers pirates" any version will do u as they're all pretty much the same.  the latest version was the best but a bit buggy.

have fun, and dont look away because of the ship stuff, its the best part!!!

yaaar!!

GoT

Personally i've had similar battles mate. I wrote a thread (probably on page 3 or 4 by now) a couple of days ago called "games stole my life but WoW gave it back" because i had similar issues.  I quit after waiting for wow for YEARS and then hated it after i was 60 and realized how much grinding and effort i'd have to put into endgame only to achieve..... ZIP.... only better items to kill badder bosses... not my idea of repetitive fun.

anyway, maybe the same game that im looking at at the moment may interest you. Its called Pirates of the Burning Seas.  THeres a review on this site and thats what got me interested.  I used to play Sid Miers pirates (single player game but one of the best single player games arguably ever made since it was made over and over and over again for different machines) and this looks VERY similar but in MMO format.  You cant just appear in Trinidad if you're in panama and your buddy on MSN tells you theres a big battle there. You'd have to hope the winds were favourable, the crew was in a good mood and the ships biscuits didnt get infested! There'd also be enemy pirates, the french navy (curses!) and coral reefs amongst other things to slow u down. OR you could catch a fast wind and get there nice ad quick.

Looks like an awesome version of the old game, and the graphics are somewhat BREATH TAKING. I've never been so impressed before and i'm not easily impressed.  Theres a screenshot of a pirate character standing in one of the towns (yes when u dock you get to walk around the town) and theres lightning storm going on and it looks bloody awesome.

Go check it out and apply for beta like me. This could be your next big thing.

by the way i've also tried and quit Ragnarok, Eve and DDO.  Not just WoW. So i'm not just an idiot who dosn't know what he's on about.  Although i dont know a great deal about pirates yet, just the original. hrm..

anyway. good luck!

GoT

yeah i've been searching for an aussie guild to join and im guessing that since most of the people on the forums are US at the moment that they just simply weren't online before becaus they were probably all at sleep :)

i just got responses from some of the threads that i posted in and im hoping to join a clan soon.  I want to kind of get into this one properly before it comes out, and do beta hopefully if i get accepted because i think this could be the game that i've been searching hi and lo for.

hopefully.

hopefully its like sid miers pirates but with real players sailing around too, well thats what it kind of looks like.

ARrghh.

Hoist the main sale!

GoT

NOt many people posting on various POTBS websites that are out there, including the main one which i've joined today and put a couple of posts up on asking various questions.

Is the community just stalled and awaiting news of the release (which is apparently supposed to be on the 25th of august) or is the whole thing pretty quiet and not going anywhere?

GoT

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Originally posted by asupermane

Glad you got your life back! i know the feeling.

exactly what you mean

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yeah it seems like a lot of people seem to understand what i'm talking about.

this morning i've been reading the pirates of the burning sea site, looks to be pretty good. I was always a huge fan of Sid Miers and his pirates game, i'm pretty sure i started playing it on c64 but maybe it was AMIGA i started on but i know that i also played the CD32 and PC versions, including the most recent release that came out last year or maybe 04 but they've all been TOP quality pirate games. 

Burning sea looks to be simply a MMO version of that, whcih could be absolute GOLD.

GoT

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Originally posted by ultradaz

Lo All

I have read this post today as i am new to this forum and i must say it is a very good post i agree that most games today are just one big grind like yourselve's say and i am 32 and have played alot of FPS/RTS/RPG's online.

These are just some of them  StrikeForce/CounterStrike/Unreal/Unreal Tournament/Mir2/Mir3 evil illusions/RuneScape/Linage/Linage2/Biosfear/KalOnline/Do-Online (MartialHero's) /WoW/ DAOC/Cronous and many many more and in theory they are all the same concept ( as you lot said the same old stuff over and over)

I at the moment have took 8 months off playing and have only just come back online again but i am currently looking around to see what is out there and what is coming out on the market but at the moment not really seen anything that catches my eye that well.

What i would like to see is a fantasy/oreintal type game that runs along a real time/ Real life type of concept where there is 1000's of different items/armours/weapons and so on and all items of clothes and so on can  be fully customised to your needs which makes everyone different to each other like it is in real life same with weapons aswell not only that but the land is so vaste that a single person can go out and build there very own home through abit of hard work and gradually build it into a home for a whole guild and wage wars againest other guilds in the same situation but still have the monsters and so on for those people that like to go out killing and building up like that but with this concept can come so many better upgrades to a game and not just the same little diff weapons or map here and there

I personally would find this concept in gaming so much more fun and entertaining to my needs

yours thankfully ultradaz 

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Gday Ultra.

I've just rated WoW, DDO and Eve since they're the 3 main ones that i've played.  I think that i rated them very fairly however its good that there's a site rating AND a player one because obviously different opinions will change from game to game.  For example i gave WoW 10/10 for graphics and i dont think any other games got a 10/10 from me, i was pretty cut throat.  I'm sure people who are avid EQ and EQII fans hate wow graphics due to the cartoony nature but its the vivid colors and beautiful characters that draw me to WoW. (more than anything else sadly). 

Ultra, good to hear your point of view and i think we've got a group of like minded individuals in this particular conversation.  I too have spent time playing a lot of the games you've mentioned and someone even mentioned Bomberman before, which i played 5 players on my AMIGA. :) hehe.. funny stuff.  also spent at least a year and a half of my youth playing A Bards Tale.

Well, I have read pretty much the whole Darkfall webpage and i think it sounds a lot closer to what im after BUT unfortunately its made by a fairly small group of programmers which is going to really limit the support and general professionalism of the game.  ALSO i don't think we'll see it in Australia.

This is a problem.  I don't think many americans/eurpeans will really understand our plight but there are a LOT of gamers in Oz when you take our population into account. Probably just as many per person then in the U.S and probably more than Europe.  The whole problem is tho that our population is so small which makes our gaming population so marginal that not many companies see fit to host servers in our country. 

WoW started its first "oceanic" server (which isn't purely Oz even) a few months ago and apparently they're SO full that you have to wait sometimes up to an hour to get on even!!!  This is a huge dissapointment considering that many people left their orginal servers to start new fresh characters on the oceanic server/s due to the fact that only the big American guilds were achieving anything and only at around 1 or 2 pm in our afternoon, which meant "no raid for u aussie unless u unemployed". (which of course most of us arn't, we go to school and work like the rest of the world, otherwise we cant pay for our expensive internet). WHICH leads me to another small topic.  The cost of playing MMO's is more for aussies than ANY other country due to our stupid Broadband rates and speeds.  We're paying for such crap internet speeds and good speeds are very expensive.

Anyway, i really do hope that Darkfall comes out with an aussie server because seriously.... we need a game that will support us like we support it.  I BET that if it had one it'd become a cult hit pretty quick and lotsa people would be playing it. All they'd have to do is promote it on overclockers.com and ausgamers.com and news would spread and shit loads would be playing it.  OR a partnership with internet/communications giant Telstra would be good as Telstra will then promote the game themselves.

Lets get it on Darkfall, come to Oz?  Will u be the next MMO that i play? Or do all us dissapointment kids have to get together and make our own game? Hey theres an idea.

GoT

you guys come up with some really good replies.  I'm starting to feel much better about this whole shit situation that i've found myself in but ive realized that after playing games starting with the commodore64 since i was old enough to load tape i've put myself in this situation.  My current magic deck for magic online luckily suffices to keep me entertained at the moment... barely.

I'd like to try that pvp game if its full pvp no safe zones that sounds like heaps of fun, i loved pvp in wow especially attacking ogrimaar, i was always one of the instigators of setting up everyone to go over there and always the last to leave, hiding on the roof tops in stealth waiting for some sucker to walk past by himself so i had a 1v1 fight on my hands :) hehe..

vertex, american mcgees alice frigin rules, nice avatar! i loved taht game to death.

have a good one guys.

GoT

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Originally posted by Synyster777
I play lineage II and I think wow is a grind so eh.....I found wow to be more of a grind just because of the fact it was a terribly boring grind and everything you do is a grind people say if you get bored of grinding try quests! ok but the quests are boring and all the same to me so they say try crafting! which was even more of a grind. Alot of mmo's have grind nowadays even Guild Wars. In order to be a good pvp player you need all the right skills and armour which means you have to play a pve character until you achieve this goal. And the pvp isn't all that good anyways lol (just imo) and everyone starts to look the same when they grind hours on end getting money and materials for the uber looking armour in guild wars. and all the armour looks the same to me except for the uber expensive ones that dont give you extra benefits.

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you guys are making so much sense its scaring me.

Its the same as the way i'm thinking but the thing thats got me is this. The previous few posters had mentioned that i should try Guild wars but now you're talking about the Grind in it and although i don't have to technically take your word over theirs you ARE making a hell of a lot of sense about why you DONT like WoW anymore which is basically the same for me.  Then the last poster after Synyster777 says similar stuff also to how i feel which is that ONLINE games are the way to go [without a doubt] but the same-old same-old dosn't cut it anymore. 

It dosn't matter if its Blizzard or not anymore (i used to live for Blizzard even if they did do same-old) because basically what we need is some different games.  Why does WoW have to be about getting better gear to be able to kill better bosses?  That's so repetitive and pointless that its not funny.  What ever happened to playing a game to see if you're any good at it? Like when i used to play CS? It was to see if you're any good and try to beat people.  NOT to just try to play more HOURS to get more raid POINTS to get more GEAR. How friggin pointless.

What i think they need cannot be explained here either in words, and in a forum post.  Perhaps i'll design a webpage to put across my views? perhaps i'll put together a package.  But what we really need is ALL of the creative dissapointed gamers to get together, put together a PROFESSIONAL package demonstrating what the game community needs to freshen up and then present it to someone that'll listen.

Or maybe not because we're still gonna be getting dished up with the same old shit anyway.

Its the waiting game now.  Wait to see if anything comes out that is different.  Orginal concepts have never been hard to come into before, so why now.

Bring it on creative geniuses.

GoT

Thanks guys you're all extremely helpful.  I think i will wait around to see what comes out.  My preferred option would be to design a game that meets all of my personal criteria and also ensure that it is possible for serious gamerz to play also. I have one in mind but gee... where did all my programmers run off to?... oh.. i didn't have any? 

lol... if only.  i have always had some great ideas, fortunately some of them are pretty common ideas and appear in games which is great so heres wishing... and hoping... that the ones im thinking of now appear in the near future.  I think Uru Online might hold the key as combat isn't 100% necesarry.  I'll give it a whirl.. Apart from that i'll hang out and wait.

GoT