I'm sure that I'm just echoing what others must've said by now (not going through 8 pages of garbage), but uhm...

1) Several WoW devs were confirmed EQ players.

2) WoW is  based on the concept behind EQ but with some new features (zone-less world), its own distinctive lore and artstyle aswell as it being more player friendly (ie. softcore) in order to appeal to a wider audience.

However, this would be no more plagiarism than say, COD:MW would be of CS. The game has since launch recieved ample time to develop and grow its own character and offers a vastly different experience from EQ.

Originally posted by pencilrick

I think Blizzard owes it to the fanbase to give some hints as to what this project might be, at least what genre it lies in. 

If I like fantasy MMO's, and the new project is a space MMO, then I know not to get my hopes up.  But if I wait two years, hoping that this will be "the game", I could be in for a let-down.

C'mon, Blizzard, give us a clue.

I beg to differ, a long time ago I too thought that hardcore style PvP and harsch death penalties was the only way to do a sucessful MMO. Fair enough, those games had a few advantages over WoW but I consider myself today a reformed gamer. Heavy PvP consequences does restrict the availability of PvP, there'll be less quantity of it and for that sake not saying more quality.

Main problem with WoW was the grind IMO, because the grind in WoW was never fun or interesting. You always have the feeling that you can't play the game until you reach max level or have farmed X ammounts of honor, unlike in games like Everquest where some people never hit the max level and yet were enjoying themselves. Wow PvE is the best PvE content I've ever experienced, however they made it ridiculously hard to access. It's just now that they've lowered the difficulty of encounters and in WOTLK most raid instances will be 10man, possibly Arthas (when his content is released) will be 25.

I was sceptical towards those who thought the next MMO from blizzard would be based on the Diablo lore, with D3 announced I really can't see why some still believe this? The Diablo setting is a fantasy one afterall and it would be hard to distinguish from WoW, with D3 to be released it just makes it ever more so unlikely to happen.

I think Starcraft Universe is the most likely option, although I can see why some think it wouldn't translate well into a MMO. That being said I think that Blizzard if anyone could pull it through, I wouldn't be surprised to see two player factions, the protoss and terrans. That would leave plenty of PvP possibilities, yet both would have a common enemy, the zerg. There's also lots of other factions that could be made into content, for instance terran rebels and rogue protoss. I can easily see Blizzard expanding their arsenal of critters into fully fledged monsters.

Main question for me would be wether it'd be skill based or a FPS, knowing Blizz I think they'd go skillbased but from what we've seen so far skillbased shooters can be quite booring. Possibly we could see a hybrid between the two, like in Hellgate. I found it to be quite an enjoyable way of doing things.

- The two other options in my mind for Blizz new MMO would be WoW II or something outside of Blizzard's IP. A far out and crazy idea would be a game based on 'Lost Vikings', but that's not very likely to happen.

I think the answer is far more simple than that, the game throws the player into BG's and public quests from level one. Problem is, this content in WAR is just not fun enough, it lacks depth and variation. Due to the grind to 40 is long and uneventful, probably because exploration is unecessary (like you say) and most people will just get fed up with it.

In order to make WAR fun again they'd need to have a system that rewards players that play all the different BG's, dramatically increase the levels of XP, polish the BG's, force people to engage in Open RvR and preferably add more content for lvl 40's.

Originally posted by buegur

"WAR isn't "a cool game with a huge fantasy world which everyone can play together in" - it's just another MMO.
"

I would disagree as WAR is exactly that, as is most MMO's, so yes it's just another MMO. 

 

Point -----------> | (wall)

<----- *bounce* | (wall)

GRAPHICS - My Rating 5

This games have shitty optimization, I can run friggin' hellgate and crysis well but not WAR? Come on, and even on systems where it does run well it still look no better than a 5 year old game like WoW. The world is sloppily put together and the animations are akward.

FUN - My Rating - 1

This game was decent until I hit lvl 15 or so, from that point on it was just a mindless grind in poorly designed BG's with people that generally don't talk much. I'd have more fun playing bejeweled with IRC running in the background. Oyea, I'm sure it changes once you reach the endgame. Yea, that altdorf place better be pretty damn hillarious.

SOUND - My Rating - 4

Ok, I wouldn't say that EVE has better sound but the sound effects in WAR are nothing special and akward at best, games like Diablo 2 have done a better job at this.

COMMUNITY - My Rating - 1

What community? Everyone just shuts the hell up because the chat sucks, you better join a guild if you don't wanna become a total shut-in. Public quests do absolutely NOTHING to help with this. Most people are fairly stupid aswell, but at least they aren't bitching about profanity.

ROLE PLAYING - My Rating - 2

This games pounds the Warhammer lore in the ass with a 10 feet jagged wooden pole with friggin' splinters in it. How is anyone s'posed to roleplay in this steaming pile of shit? That being said, orcs and dwarves are cool so one point each for those two being relatively well done (except that warhammer dwarves don't fucking build steam trains, this isn't WoW you dumb fucks! AND WHAT THE FUCK IS UP WITH THE GYROCOPTER ON MY BACK?).

PERFORMANCE / LAG - My Rating - 4

Like already said, it runs like shit on my system for no reason whatsoever, however, It doesn't crash that often and has no major stability issues considering that it's a freshly launched game. Too bad is sucks donkeyballs.

VALUE - My Rating 1

Well, if you have a computer then it's relatively pointless since there's an abundance of other things that you could be doing that are free and far more entertaining (the internet is for...) and certainly can't be any less productive than playing WAR. If you don't have a computer then the discs may serve well as frisbees, or you could possibly use the package as table support.

SERVICE - My Rating - 5

OP makes a good point, but out of sheer spite for the fact that they put the servers down for a good while just to copy (my lvl 12 or something char) to a (probably dead and forsaken) server for no valid reason whatsoever. If people don't want lagg and queues, they effin' reroll. Oh noes I lost the time invested in my lvl 10-20 character *cry*. You know what you lost Mythic? My subscription.

Originally posted by buegur

"4) Most people have played WoW as their first MMO experience, the MMO concept isn't new or magical to anyone anymore."

 

Thats your opinion which doesn't really matter in the long run.  The MMO experience obviously doesn't make you happy anymore, but for millions that statement is just plain wrong.

No, actually it's very much fact. WoW intrigued many new ppl to the world of MMOs since it previously (to them) had been nothing like it. The label of 'new' and 'fresh' has always been held in high esteem my marketing agencies and for good reason.

I still very much enjoy MMOs, just not WAR. However if WAR had been my first MMO I would imagine that it'd seem very cool with huge, near-seemless world with thousands of users online at the same time. I remember how back in the days of EQ an MMO was something special, it was different. The players were pioneers in a relatively unknown genre and people would give you odd looks when you said how many hrs/week you played or that you actually PAYED to play! WoW made it all mainstream, WAR isn't  "a cool game with a huge fantasy world which everyone can play together in" - it's just another MMO.

Actually, it makes perfect sense. I bought WAR, imported the US verison which resulted in me paying around 100$ for it. I didn't like the whole headstart system but I could've cared less, I happily made a dwarf ironbreaker and found myself to be enjoying the game. The game ran like shit on my system which can run Hellgate London on high settings without glitches, heck it even does a good job at Crysis. However, at maximum framerate settings it ran "ok", that being said it doesn't even look very good on a system that can run it well. I didn't mind though, because I was having decent fun.

Then I realised that the grind to 40 was basically one long bg-grind to 40 and after that it'd most likely just be poor poorly designed BG's, the world PvP seemed dead and the Warhammer lore was just raped entirely (as expected). I'm sorry, I don't mind grinds (heck I played EQ to 70) but I've done AV in WoW once already and AV was much more fun, mind you.

The game quickly got booring, I uninstalled and cancelled my sub. I want my money back but noo..

So this is a warning, if you want a game where the PvP is fun and you don't have to grind the same shit over and over again, then don't play WAR. At least the shit you had to grind in WoW had shiny colors.

FUCK WAR.

Originally posted by Mahlo

There are lots of tabletop players who play WAR. Just look on the Warseer forum. I'm building my first army currently. It was on hold but playing WAR encouraged me to get on with it. I'm going to start building a table this week.

If you need any help or advice with building a table, feel free to PM me.

I have four main gripes with the game...

1) The game is just not fun, the way to 40 is basically just one long bg-grind and the BG's are poorly made, unbalanced and not really intriguing enough. I'd take WSG in WoW anyday over these BG's. The fact that everyone groups at certain BG's limits the choices of BG's that you can use for leveling. The PvE content is fairly dead and uninteresting.

2) It RAPES the Warhammer lore

3) It's system demanding and even on a good system really looks no better than WoW, the world looks sloppily put together, animations are choppy - although the character skins are nice.

4) This game is no more RvR (which is basically a fancy and overused word for PvP from Mythic) than WoW, which is one of the most softcore and initially non-pvp oriented MMOs that I know of. I expected at least 3 different factions or at least something to make it stand out, only thing new about it is that you can level through PvP (Oh sorry, I meant 'RvR') and that turned out just to be a dull grind.

That being said, I think Mythic did some things right, for instance the blocking (making tanks alot more attractive in PvP) and the high toughness of the characters, making instant deaths in group PvP less common.

My question is, will WAR survive the next 1 or 2 years?

It's just not that fun and as people have afk'd their way (in what is a really booring BG grind) to 40, how long will they stay intrigued with the game?

I really wanted a new MMO, I bought and played the game but got fed up with it after a week or so. It's just not  fun.

Well for two reasons mainly,

1) It's just not a great game, there are many issues with it and I personally just found it booring.

2) It's system demanding, it looks like utter crap until you've got a really good computer, something everyone just doesn't have.

3) It fucks the warhammer lore over entirely {Mod Edit}

4) Most people have played WoW as their first MMO experience, the MMO concept isn't new or magical to anyone anymore.

1) Don't have the option of trial accounts.

2) Block messages from characters that aren't above level 10 or in their appropiate level zone. Guild chat and people who've added you to their buddy lists will be exempt from this.

3) Ban the accout of gold sellers at first offence.

4) Ban people who buy gold at first offence.

5) Use the soulbound system.

6) Make character development less dependant on gold and other farmable re-sellable ingame items.

- I can assure you, that if steps 1-6 were taken then gold selling really wouldn't be an issue.

They are pretty much the only straight forward healing class in the game and as such are a huge asset to the forces of order. Their damage shields and buffs don't seem to have that much of an impact at the earlier levels of play but I can imagine that they will swing the tide of battles at higher tier PvP.

Some may find them a bit booring though...

Myep, PUGs will get owned. But I can foresee the premade (or 'fixed') vs premade fights to be really interesting.

Originally posted by xblast5000

I am noticing three different types of reviews and each of them having similarities.  The negative ones tend to compare it to WoW and WoW was obviously their first MMO.  So obviously these people are WoW fanboys.  The average to slightly above average review tend to be players that started with UO or EQ.  These reviews claim that it is a good game it just doesn't do anything new and is the same as the genre ever was.  But usually think its better than whats on the market atm.  Last there are the extremely positive reviews which contend that this game is the best thing to ever happen and these people are usually mythic or war fanboys.  So my guess would be the second review being closest to the truth.

Wow, talk about running everyone over the same curb? No, people don't compare it to WoW 'because it was their first MMO'. People compare it to WoW because it's the most well known MMO and one of the same genre, sharing many similarities with WAR Online. Secondly, those who compare it to WoW do not give it exclusively poor feedback.

I for one played MUDs way before Ultima and EQ was out, played EQ for a long while, then EVE Online and WoW. Does that make me more pro? Can I have a larger e-peen now and say "OH LOEL U ONLEH PLAY WOW U NO KNOW GOOD GAME"? Please...?

Seriously, put a sock in it. But in any case, most of the reviews seem to reflect my own opinion. It's a good game, not as polished as WoW was on release but not as bad as MMO launches have been in the past, yet considerably better than AoC. It's nothing radical, a typical fantasy MMO with a healthy focus on PvP and with a slightly more slow paced combat than what we've grown used to (which necessarily doesn't have to be a bad thing).

- With a good community and continious efforts from Mythic Entertainment WAR Online could succeed in providing an excellent game for those who like PvP, are tired of WoW but who would like a new fantasy MMO to play. If things go well we can expect a solid million subs and if it stays afloat it may very well snatch another million but it won't kill WoW and noone expected it to.

My only big gripe with the game is how they murder the lore... =/

No the game isn't choppy and PvP is quite smooth really, but Bright Wizards are insane. I'm glad they're on our side...

Tested it now and I can say the following about it,

WAR is reasonably polished, not as polished as WoW was on release but not far from it. However it's drastically smaller in size in terms of content. That's not to say that the game won't keep you busy for quite some time ahead. The game is fairly stable and even handles tabbing quite well, although not during loading screens. But yes, you will encounter a few strange bugs, glitches and get momentarily stuck in terrain objects at times.

The classes don't have alot of depth but they're still rather well designed, although much character balancing needs to be done. I didn't find the Warrior Priests to be that bad, however the Burning Wizards pretty much burns the whole place to a crisp if allowed a moment of peace.

The PvP was fun for me, although much more slow paced than WoW. People generally don't die as quick and healing will spoil anyones day. You need to focus your damage on a single player in order to be effective, either that or be a Bright Wizard. I can see the stacking, combination and synergy of certain abilities to become very powerful and I expect to see much of these to be used in higher tier PvP, once guilds and groups start to be more serious about RvR (which is just another lame word for normal PvP, there's really nothing more RvR about WAR than WoW). The open areas seemed pretty dead with few people in them, often being scarcely populated by mobs or none at all. The dwarven starting grounds were mostly just raided by the far more popular orcs 'n goblins, which made much of the place inaccessible to the dwarf players.

- The fact that it takes longer to die is an advantage in large scale PvP, but hurt the small scale PvP engagements. WAR's system wouldn't work in WoW's arena very well, but proves to be alot more entertaining in the battlegrounds.

The public quests are like AoC's special attack system, overhyped and not that effective. Sure, the public quests are entertaining to do at least once because they're fairly cinematic. It's like Assassin's creed, cool once but then it kinda gets old. It also completely fails to create any sense of companionship and co-up, people just do the stuff or happened to stumble upon the quest and then hope that they get lucky with the roll for the rewards.. most often winning nothing and having to do it all over again or grow fed up with it and go somewhere different.

The graphics are adequate, despite not having access to high quality textures (probably due to bandwith limitations). The characters look fairly good, especially the Orcs, goblins and dwarfs and they're all a step up from the graphics of WoW. However the world in WAR can look rather sloppily put together at times and I'd say that WoW makes a better job there instead. It also seems to run quite fine on an above average system and I believe that it will run on low quality settings even on poor machines.

As for the PvE it was rather mweh, didn't come across a single instance but I hear that some are s'posed to be in the game. Mobs are fairly stupid, have slow reaction times and the aggro range is so short that it makes the mobs seem really retarded.

The community on the test servers was fairly dead, very quiet. Too quiet in fact, people only talked when adressed and not even that at times. However, it was damn nice to see people use more roleplay names again instead of the usual "SHaodwdeath" "DEadlyassasin" yatta yatta that you see in other games. Hopefully though the game will become more cheerful on launch.

As a conclusion, WAR can be a fun game and for anyone who likes PvP, is tired of WoW but who wants another fantasy MMO. My only real gripe with the game is how they screwed the warhammer lore and feel of the Orc 'n Goblins by teaming them up with Chaos and the Dark Elves. I'd also liked to have see three factions in this game instead of just two, in order to make it stand out and be a real option to WoW.

Ah well, I think that most people who try it, will enjoy it. This isn't the pile of shit that AoC was, rest assured.

- Sajt

Assuming that things don't drastically change at higher levels, then healing WILL become more frequent at higher levels as things get more serious. It's just TOO powerful not to be used, I can see organized groups using stacking up on certain abilities and combinations in order to gain a considerable advantage over their opponents in the scenarios.

- And no, you don't have to heal only because you rolled what you consider to be a healing class. The fact that they can DPS proves you very wrong, now doesn't it? As for WP's they're not that great, bright wizards however can dominate a battlefield, especially when paired up with other bright wizards.

Originally posted by Leucent

What ascension said. Also if you go look at the million post out there that has stated how different they are you would nt ask such a silly question. Anything else that Ascension hasn t said i can t say due to a little thing called a NDA. Please stop with the WOW and WAR comparisons especially the pvp. Once again i ll say there not even remotely close to the same, go do some research.

Ah, touché my good sir, if you so happened to be aiming for your ass.

It's true that I could do a search around these boards which mostly consist of two things, namely rubbish posts and fucktards like yourself. Quite frankly, people like your's truly prefer just to ask a provocative question for a fast answer than to stand waist-deep in shit looking for a remotely intelligent response that can be of any use.

As for the NDA I'm sure that no person would ever have the AUDACITY to break it. I mean, last time I checked Mythic was working together with Batman to punish those who let their lips slip (guess what happened that Ledger fellow,  I ain't joking and so ain't Heith no more). Because MY GOD LAD, just think of the consequences if someone did? You know, the four horsemen and all that.. yatta yatta..

As for the comparison of  WoW and WAR I think WoW makes an absolutely perfect benchmark to judge other MMO's by. But hey, if you want to be oldskool 'n kool with the kids I can always use something older like DAoC, EQ, Ultima or why don't we just compare it to MUDs (I'd recommend MUME, it's a great one and it's still running)? Heck, suddenly WAR don't look so bad anymore, it's actually got graphics!

- Or are you implying that WoW's PvP can't be compared with WAR's because it has more PvP instances and the option for guild siege warfare? The syngergy between PvP and PvE isn't exactly fresh, even WoW did something like it when they introduced Ahn'Qiraj. Oh and Guild PvP is a pretty fair tradeoff for Arena...

EDIT: Mweh, why do I even bother.. . As a zombie would've put it,  waste of perfectly good brainz.