Originally posted by wormywyrm

I thought the interview was interesting, but if you are a fan of sandboxes, read up on Brad McQuaid, and you might come to the conclusion that I have that he has contributed strongly to the death of sandboxes over the last decade.

His piss-poor management of Sigil ran Vanguard into the ground, which was the last hope of AAA sandboxes of the last decade.  After Vanguard's failure, few developers will have the guts to put the big money into a sandbox game.  Brad's vision was good and I love his passion, but if you read up on the way he managed his company it is obvious that he has some serious issues and is at fault for VG's failure...

2002, sandbox MEO cancelled and replaced by linear LOTRO

2003, linear WoW is released to unprecedented success

2004, SWG undergoes 'enhancements' to make it more linear

2006, Brad runs VG, the last big budget sandbox, into the ground

2012, still no big budget sandboxes on the horizon, save maybe a korean game

 

 Sorry but VG was never going to be a sandbox.  It was suppose to follow the path of EQ in it's core design but Brad decided to chase the golden carrot and wanted a slice of WoW's pie.

SWTOR UI sucks if you are a healer.  It's fine in normal group missions but a mass of frustrations if you are trying to heal in a battleground.  The UI will not update properly it displays the wrong health information for Op members.  The UI shows people with full health but in reality they are one laser shot away from death.  IMO Bioware needs to sort the UI out as top priority.

If you are interested in the PvP servers I would suggest Whitefall or Bloodiron.  Unfortunately I cannot speak for the PvE server's.  The link below has the offical server status which may be a help in choosing.

http://uk.riftgame.com/en/shardstatus/index.php  scroll down for the EU shards.

Don't let the hype overtake you.  At present you don't have to worry about which game to play.  Someone else in the post mentioned SWTOR is not going to be release until the end of the year.  Stick with Rift for now.  Hopefully by the end of the year more information will be released, NDA lifted etc.  You may have had you fill of Rift by the time TOR releases to make the decision easier.  No harm in waiting, at most you may miss the early access, but you will also miss the worse of all the launch issues that plague release.

@OP

Game.co.uk still have CE editions available if you are after all the in-game items from the deluxe version.

At least wait for the game to release before making these types of predictions.  The majority haven't even had a chance to play it yet.

Originally posted by grunt187

Originally posted by Buccaneer

I will not pre-order on blind faith anymore.  I've been burnt a couple of times in the past.  Hopefully I have grown a little bit wiser and able to resist the hype on soon to be released games.  If I pre-order now it's due to getting some hands on experience, i.e. I pre-ordered Rift due to the beta weekends.

Been burnt on girlfriends but im not giving up Pu**y.

 Something I can agree with.

I have to agree with some of the other posters, it would be best to leave Dune's IP alone.  It would most likely take the same path the likes of WAR and DCU have taken.

I will not pre-order on blind faith anymore.  I've been burnt a couple of times in the past.  Hopefully I have grown a little bit wiser and able to resist the hype on soon to be released games.  If I pre-order now it's due to getting some hands on experience, i.e. I pre-ordered Rift due to the beta weekends.

@OP

I just checked Amazon.com and the collectors edition is priced at $19.99.

Edited to add link

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_4?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=rift&sprefix=rift

Originally posted by tinuelle

Originally posted by Creslin321

Originally posted by tinuelle

Reason for no open beta?

1. Avoid the F2P kiddos

2. Avoid F2P kiddos forumspamming

3. Avoid F2P kiddo bad community ingame grief-festival

 To a company trying to sell subscriptions...

"F2P Kiddo" = "Potential Customer"

Trust me, its gonna be some time before SWTOR goes F2P and "F2P Kiddo" = "Potential Customer"

But of course, when it goes F2P your statement is valid :)

 I maybe wrong but I thought Creslin was suggesting the F2P kiddo can be converted to a paying (subs) customer.

I answered no to all the questions.

The days of getting hyped over a MMO are over for me;  I've been burnt too many times in the past.  I'm going to wait for the game to come out and read some constructive reviews from the players or hopefully trial the game before jumping in.  The other benefit of this approach is I will avoid the bedlam of the first few weeks, i.e. sever queue's, over crowding etc.

I found it a hard question to answer.

My most memorable experiences in a MMO was EQ, which is technically a themepark.  I've also got some good memories from VG.  I've played most of the other themeparks like WoW, LOTRO, WAR and AoC etc but nothing memorable jumps out.

I feel the difference between these games is the game worlds.  EQ and VG games worlds IMO offer loads of immersion whilst the others is more of a paint by numbers game.

I can't comment on sandboxes.  The only one I've spent a decent amount of time in was UO for a couple of months before I moved to EQ, but still I have more fond memories of UO than I do modern day themeparks.

Originally posted by elocke

14. Best sound/soundtrack - Age of Conan - felt like this needed to be added, I'm a huge audiophile

100% agree.  AoC is the only game I've gone out and paid out cash for the soundtrack.

Originally posted by raystantz

Just curious, if you were to answer the following questions.. which games would be your choice for each?

1. Best Graphics (combination of style + technical)

Age of Conan.  FFIV comes close but some of the character models let it down (IMO).

2. Smoothest Controls

I can't decide to be honest.

3. Best User Interface

EQ2 -  I don't know why, I just prefer it compared to the WoW type interface.

4. Best Character creation

I have to give this one to Aion. 

5. Best Class and Race choices

I'm going to give this one to Vanguard.  The playable races are your standard fare, but IMO it's got the best selection of classes in a MMO.

6. Best PVE leveling content.

Vanguard

7. Best Crafting

Vanguard - I know alot of people prefer SWG system, but never played it for more than a few weeks so unable to compare.

8. Best Fluff content ( housing, pets.. etc.)

Easy one, it has to be EQ2

9. Best community

Toss a coin between EQ, LOTRO and VG.

10. Best Player vs. Player content

Hard for me to answer.  I was an EQ crack head and didn't give DAOC a chance.  I'm going to answer this one by the games I enjoyed PvP the most.  EQ2 was great fun when the PvP servers was first launched.  I enjoyed the BG's in WAR and I enjoyed the open world PvP in WoW before the honor system and BG's was introduced.

11. Most immersive experience?

Have to give this one to EQ with VG coming second.

12. Biggest world?

I'm not sure which games has/had the biggest world. I don't care how big a world is, it's just got to be immersive.

13. Best Endgame

Hard one for me to answer, I've never been one for raiding, doing the same stuff over and over again, chasing the loot trail.  The journey is important for me, not the destination. I'm a slow leveler.  I like to explore my surroundings, craft roll alts etc.

Vanguard gets my vote.  I'm still waiting/hoping for another dev team to pick it up and give it some much needed love and support.

I just rolled a bard  for my alt.  Still in the early teens, but so far enjoying it very much. The heal component of your main damage spell means I can take on a lot more mobs at once.  I have to agree with one of the other posters, the best Bard I have played is in Vanguard.  I 'm hoping one day some other dev studio will have a look at the classes in VG amd implement some of the games class designs.

I'm a sad panda.  I got in, made my character so I could get the name I wanted.  Logged out and came back 20 minutes later and now I can't get in.

But on a positive note it looks like Flippy's start to life is a roaring success.

I'm keeping my CE pre-order (hard copy, so I get all the goodies, flash drive etc), but at present I'm more excited about the upcoming release of the EQ TLP server than the launch of Rift.  I'm going to play my 30 days in between EQ sessions and see how I feel at the end of the 30 days.  I enjoyed Rift more playing in short bursts, i.e. around a hour or two during the beta.  Any longer I started to get a bit bored.  If I get  a few days worth of entertainment out of Rift, it will be money well spent.  The only problem, I cannot see myself playing over the long haul.

IMO Rift is a good game, not great but decent enough to waste a few hours.

Great, thanks for the headsup.  My account is active and now I'm in the process of downloading the game.  Hopefully see ya all on the 15th.