Far be it for me to come across as a graphics hoe, in fact I despise players like that. I play old games all the time, SNES, PSX, etc. But Grandia 1 *is* pretty damn rough around the edges. Like say, Legend of Legaia. Another RPG I enjoyed immensely, despite the really primitive 3D - it was painful to watch.

While Isaak is extreme, he has a point. If moderation WORKED and people actually got banned for violating the TOS, this shit wouldn't have happened.

I'm all for privacy of personal information, but say what you want, people use the anonymity of the internet to be assholes. Irrefutable fact. Blizzard does need to clean up their forums.

I'm a fence-sitter -- I'm pretty game for anything, it's usually the multitudes of fucktards in a game which ruin the experience for me.

I don't see anything "wrong" with this concept. Hell, the legions of noob powerlevelers out there are basically trying to remove the progression from their games, albeit the companies aren't blameless for the entrenchment of the grind mentality. And you see everywhere some Tom, Dick, or Harry talking about their uber leet raids. So obviously a lot of people wouldn't mind just having this gameplay aspect without the tedious (to them) pre-preparation.

More power to them. We need more friggen' choice. The more types of games there are available, the less QQing of people who don't like something but feel like they must play it just because it's the latest SUV with chrome wheels and spinners the devs put out.

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Originally posted by melmoth1

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Nothing in the Ebert blog contributed to this debate and his definition of art was largely a motley collection of quotes, a cliched collection of "great works" that idiots the world over accept as great art because they  have been told it's so (a bit like people who stuff their shelves with Booker prize list books), and an unconscious endorsement of the idea that art is an objective, descriptive category.

...

I kinda harbor an impossible hope that video games will NEVER be recognized as art because it would save the genre from smug and insufferable custodians of taste like Ebert and Bloom and the Booker judges. When video games are "officially" recognized as art it would to do to our games what the art critics and custodians of high-culture did to surrealism: castrate what was once virile and fresh into a safe and sterile medium for the bourgeoisie to discuss in their dull ego-stroking dinner parties.

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People who depend on critics to tell them what is art are the same kind of dumbasses who habitually buy every Next Big Thing on the tv shopping channel, believe in the healing and eternal youth rejuvinating powers of crystal, and swear that Elvis was seen at a nearby 7-11 because the tabloids said so.

Class balance isn't going to fool anyone, especially considering that the game is basically a pile of fail. A secondhand one, at that (see: Dekaron).

The sheer amount of ignorance in this thread would be amazing if one wasn't used to listening to little kids on the internet QQing about shit they don't know about. Doesn't sound like there's even one econ major between the dozen of you fools here.

Giantsquid put it quite aptly. Also, just because a lot of companies are Doing It Wrong (i.e. abusing the concept by selling OP stuff or ignoring the balance between people who don't buy ingame items and those who do) doesn't invalidate the whole concept.

You guys act like playing an MMO is like a fucking marriage - pick one and then stick with it through thick and thin, defending it even when it does things wrong (fanboy). Invariably you feel like you have to piss all over other games clamoring for your attention. After all, you can't afford to sub 4-5 games at the same time can you? So obviously your choice must be right... right?

Pffft.

With f2p you're free to pick and choose, or heck even play multiple games at the same time. Or not play them, when the mood strikes. You can have like 10 games going on, this week you'd maybe play games 1,2,5 then next week you'd play 3 and 9, then maybe grind on game 4 for a whole month.

With subscriptions you're pretty much fucked. Not only have you already paid IN ADVANCE for an entire month's worth of play, if you don't play then you feel like you wasted your money. Not to mention things happen IRL which can prevent you from playing for a while. "Oh man I had finals this month, I have to study", "I really need to get this report done, it's a hundred-thou account", or crap like that.

But hey, who cares, it's daddy's credit card right?

I have no idea whether the sequel will ever be localized or not - there is a latin american server though (of the first game iirc). As you say, the main things which killed it is pretty much due to seeming lack of resources.

Let's forget about messy content details like exp/grind. On the surface Holic was actually decent to play. That means there's already a working game engine. The problem is what you build on top of this. This is where Holic fell down.

We could go on and on discussing and comparing various other f2p games, but let's not get distracted with that. You could load Holic and run around in it, and see other players do their thing too. Ok. The problem lay in the content, i.e. the game experience.

- The grind was terrible. In itself, not so much, except that it was coupled to a basically forced class AND stat progression. As I pointed out, only gear distinguishes you from another player. Since most MMOs sport a measly variety of items, you can pretty much bet that your level X class Y character will be the exact same as other level X class Y characters.

- No PvP. Having experienced the gankfests characterized by games filled with bots, griefers, and spammers I can only say this is a good thing; on the other hand, I'm objective enough to recognize that well-structured PvP provides a LOT of fun and challenge (guild siege, tournaments, prize duels, etc). So, no PvP means the game will be boring for many people and not have much end-game staying power. A tiny plus point for not being mindless pk, but huge minus point for no PvP at all.

- Multiclassing. This isn't new but at least it's new in F2P games (yes, I've played plenty of them, and no I haven't seen them offer true multiclassing - that "second job" schtick is a poor compromise). The problem is the designers don't seem to know WTF multiclassing is about. It is NOT about simply "swoosh" metamorphosing you into a CARBON COPY character of another class: that is Doing It Wrong. Multiclassing is supposed to enrich character customization, by allowing you to TWEAK your development. Not to make an entire 100% change into the target class. If you changed everything when you multiclassed then WTF is the point? You may as well just create another character of the other class.

In Holic you could go to the class NPC and even change into all the other classes. Such flexibility, good amirite? Well not really, all it means is that instead of having to create multiple characters to sample the different jobs, all you ever need is just one character, and change classes on the fly as necessary. This isn't totally bad but then again it's not very good either - as I said, what is the point? Other than the minor convenience (?) of having everything lumped into one single character. Even then it compromises your identity: what are you, a fighter? A support healer? A magic user? You are simply another interchangeable cog, no different than the other guy beside you. Individuality is important. There's a reason sales of fashion items is the mainstay of many f2p games' item malls / cash shops.

-
Given these faults, Holic stands out as being very generic and shallow. Those are pretty fatal, given that most MMOs ARE generic and shallow. It'll need a real deep overhaul to take it anywhere. From what I hear of the alleged sequel it's mostly the same but for added PvP - I don't know how well that went over, but I can imagine it can't be all that great given all the limitations we've seen so far.

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Originally posted by Larry2298
My old weapon cost me US$15-25 to upgrade to +6 and my new weapon cost me US$15 to upgrade to +5, supposed I will upgrade to +6 with my new weapon which may cost me another US$10. 
I look at the new weapon, hmm, the stats looks promising then I merged 2 weapons, click merge, crying and angry,  my new weapon being downgraded and my old weapon is gone to the air. Th new weapon preview before merge are totally a junk, lv40-50 weapon but worse than my old weapon lv30-40. Now, if I am going to use my new weapon to have same damage like me disappeared old weapon, it will cost me least US$ 80.
Some people said the new weapon preview is 20% chance but it never show up any warning in the merge window that I may lose or downgraded. 
It makes me to think most F2P just want to make money and do not responsible for customer's benefit, or even lack of in game information. Although Talisman Online website required grinding to gain website skill point to use SEARCH function.
I had enough with F2P.

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I don't see what's bad about that. So you see their gear: they can see yours too. This means duels / guild sieges will be more interesting since you can make more detailed preparations.

On the other hand... is this an open PK game? I just need to know this. I'm tired of mindless gankfests, give me some real PvP action FFS.

I'm enjoying this discussion, but just an observation.

- Most casual players don't really have a dependable group of friends, so they're usually at the mercy of whoever's available to group. So, a group might be heavy on healing and light on damage for example (say 2 priest-types and a warrior). Or 4 mages (all ranged magic, crap melee defense).

I dunno how much bearing party composition should have, but it's not insignificant. Well, carry on.

Screw $0.02, here's my one buck fifty:

- Active GMs. The presence of un-banned spammers is usually a major warning sign that the company either doesn't give a shit about their servers, or that they don't have enough staff to patrol them. Fail.

- Community tools, NOT simply "community" - people will always be people, you cannot change that. What you CAN do is give the player base a way of managing and separating the asswipes from people who actually want to play. Most games don't even have such basic communication tools like ignore lists. Atlantica Online was one of the recent few games which actually forced positive interaction, and it works. People can't be TRUSTED to behave: you have to force them to. Otherwise you get games filled with bots, farmers, and griefers. Fail.

- Non-linear equipment increases. FFS, we're not in the era of limited-hardware 8-bit machines any more. Why the f*** are games still using "wood sword -> bronze sword -> iron sword -> gold sword" style of equipment?! This turns all players into carbon copies of each other: "at level X, player from class Y will be wearing Z kind of armor." Not just fail, but EPIC FAIL.

- REAL PvP. Give us Realm vs Realm, tournaments, skirmishes, defend castle/stronghold, sieges, war, etc. Give us PvP that needs REAL SKILL. None of this stupid mindless free-for-all pk. Gankfests are so 1990s. Fail.

...

Well, that's pretty much it. Surprised I didn't mention graphics or sound? That shit is just surface polish. If the game underneath it sucks everything else doesn't matter. I'm even open to class/classless debates. I leave that all up to the creativity (or lack thereof...) of each game company. What I want is a solid base which I've outlined in the points above. I'm sure I've forgotten many other important points, but that's what other people posting here are for.

As much as I despise credit cards, the OP has a point. Forcing someone to leave a (legit) financial trail IS enough of a barrier to entry to get rid of most of those asswipes. Then again, having a decent roster of GMs online to oversee the game would do that too, and most MMOs don't even bother. They reap what they sow.

FFS, I've seen private servers staffed better - all it takes is to have enough GMs to fill your roster 24/7, and ban anyone who breaks the rules. This isn't rocket science, and we aren't in the 1990s.

[quote]Originally posted by LiquidWolf
Everytime someone says WoW, or Warcraft, came out before Warhammer... I always refer back to that link. It is by far the best response I have encountered to date simply because... there are a few people who just don't get it.
I was lucky enough to pick up the re-release of Space Hulk this fall... I brought it home and had a friend say, "Cool! They released a Starcraft Board Game?"
I beat him with foam covered bat.[/b][/quote]
Lucky friend, if it were one of mine I'd beat them with a steel bat.

I'm mostly a PvE guy because many games fail at creating a balanced and fun PvP system, but that's not to say PvP should/shouldn't be in a post-apoc game. It can go either way. I don't see why it "MUST" or "MUST NOT" be in the game. Post-apoc is just like any other theme, there can be good PvP in it if the devs do it right.

The key is Doing It Right, of course.

Since you asked for a simple answer, it is "No."

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Originally posted by Shiva_Shadow
Destined not to play.
I only got about through about 10 mins to this game before boredom overtook me and I was uninstalling it.  Far less time than it took to download and uninstall it I might add.
Besides lacking fullscreen, the graphics make SNES look awesome.

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I don't know about you, but being able to do other things while playing a game is de rigueur nowadays. Maybe some people just stick to the game, but many of us do plenty of other things in the background, like looking up info in the forums, or even non-game related tasks like firing up winamp to replace most games' usually uninspiring music.

How is Faitu wrong? He did correctly point out that the features mentioned are not "unique", and without unnecessarily being insulting either. This is information that is useful to people who have played many MMOs and should have more than a passing familiarity with what is considered "typical" as opposed to what is TRULY "unique".

I'm not interested in reading sanitized reviews. I've played too many damn MMOs. I'd appreciate it if people laid off the freaking hyperbole.

It's a fucking review from last goddamn year, wtf is your problem? Necroing a bunch of old threads? It's not even actually bad like the usual incoherent drivel posted here. You must have the attention span of an 8-yr old CounterStrike player if even that measly summing up was too much for you. Go back to school.

PC gaming for me. Two words, "mods" and "emulators". However, I'm not picky. I do console gaming as well. If there's something I want to play, I buy the game - having watched friends play it, of course, to make sure I'm not buying something I'll regret.

I don't have to "decide" or "make a choice" on what I want to play on. Limiting yourself like that is just stupid. Play what you want to play, not what people tell you to play. It's your own money, it's your own entertainment.

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Originally posted by Zinzan

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Originally posted by Ozmodan

Aion is the typical asian grindfest, just dressed up a bit.  It has all the junk usually associate with such.  Personal shops that clutter and lag the cities. Channels which means everything is instanced, want to play with a friend, find the channel they are in. Bad pvp design, 2 faction wars just don't work, once someone starts winning constantly the rest leave.  Little to do at end game except pvp, oh yeah that will eventually break too.  Minimal crafting design, nothing to keep anyone playing.

So enjoy your journey to end game, but don't race through it, because you will quit when you get there.

 

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Seems ignorance got up out of the wrong side of the bridge this morning.

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