Since no one bothered to answer I will reply to my own thread  based on my in game experience thus far so that future individuals who are wondering know.

- Absolutely nothing major or essential has changed with the exception of the two new jobs. You can basically come back, avoid the expansion as of right now (4/24/13) and miss nothing but the two new jobs. I'm sure in 3-4 months there will be a lot more content and at that point there might actually be some "major" changes in the game. 

Doesn't really sound like it would be the kind of game I would be willing to pay a monthly fee for. 

Thanks for the info guys. 

Hey guys, Ill keep it short and sweet. 

I am a veteran player, played this game 2002-2007 then again for most of the year 2011. I am familiar with the game was until right around early 2012. The last thing I remember is finishing up my AF3+2 (I think it was) on my Dragoon (my only main job). I wanted to know what major changes happend to the game during this last expansion "Seekers of Adoulin" and if these changes significantly change the way the game is played? 

Also I am curious.

What is the "New" end game content ? 

What classes are the "gimp classes" right now for most end game content? <-- I know this changes about as frequently as Taylor Swift changes boyfriends. 

What are the "Flavor of the month" jobs? 

Thanks. 

Every mmo has some kind of niche, or some kind of thing that it does better than other games. For some games that is some special combat system, for others it is a type of game play mechanic that makes it unique. Rift on paper looks like a game very similar to World of Warcraft with a different graphics engine. Now I am currently playing the free trial up to level 20 and am having a moderately good time. My biggest disappointment thus far has been the horrible character aesthetics during the character creation. Needless to say I am not very happy with the way my character looks, but there were no real good options for male characters to begin with imo. Anyhow I digress, what is Rift's unique feature? What is its main draw or lure that makes it different from other fantasy style mmos? What does it do better than the others? 

I can't quite figure this out yet and still do not know if I will subscribe to it or not. As I said earlier, I am having a moderately good time with the game but the aesthetics are just not selling me at this point. The fact that some NPC's are nearly twice the size of my character also significantly bothers me and completely destroys any sense of immersion I would have had during the story Rift events. 

I realize that I have only really played the game for 15 levels so far and have likely not seen any of the major game mechanics and distinctions at work quite yet. With that said, I would really like to understand what the game is about a bit more before I decide whether or not I will shell out my $15/mo for it.

Hope to get some good replies.

Thanks. 

I love so many things about Rift but I just cannot get over the horrible character apperances (faces, eyes, mouth, etc.) and the hideous armor selections.... 

If only those two things changed I would probably make rift my main mmo. 

First of all there is a lot to love about this game. The graphics, music, questing, dungeons, dynamic events, cooperative atmosphere and fantastic community make this one of the best mmorpg games I have ever played. I have enjoyed my time in Guild wars 2 for over 6 months now leveling both Mesmer and Thief to 80, spending hundreds of hours in the game's immersive and dynamic PvE / PvP content.

I believe that this is by far one of the best mmorpg games developed to date hands down.

With all of the above said,  in a matter of 90 minutes I went from being an officer to a guild of 104 players,doing WvW  and leveling my alt characters to deciding to uninstall the game and likely leave for a very long period of time.

Now I am sure that everyone here is going to likely find my reasons for feeling the need to leave the game so spontaneously a bit bizarre and maybe just plain nuts; but the following two reasons for leaving hit me so hard and so fast that I simply lost every little bit of motivation to play the game. I went from wanting to advance my character and kicking butt in PvP to wanting nothing to do with the game all in a matter of minutes.

While having a great time leveling my newly created warrior today with a few of my guild members we decided to go to the vendors to sell and upgrade our gear / loot. When I arrived at the vendor I looked through the weapons list eager to get my hands on a very particular type of weapon. To my surprise this weapon was not only unavailable, but didn't actually exist in the game! What I am  referring to is the two handed axe or Greataxe. Now I do not know how in the world I played the game for over 6 months and world cleared two characters to 80 without noticing this weapon was missing in the game. I immediately started feeling a very powerful sense of disconnect with my character, but I played along as if nothing was wrong all the while a heavy feeling of dissonance was taking hold within me. After about 30 min I began to notice that I didn't really feel like a warrior should feel in a game, or at least how I believe a warrior should feel. I was not using the quintessential warrior weapon! (e.g., I felt like a ranger would if he didn't have the option to choose a longbow as a weapon, only crossbows, short bows, and throwing weapons)  — needless to say I just wasn't enjoying myself so I decided to go back to playing on my Mesmer. After about 15 min of playing on my Mesmer it hit me... I don't feel any different playing with a Mesmer vs. a Thief, vs. a Warrior, it all feels the same.

Now don't get the wrong idea, I don't mean the play style which is drastically different, I mean the inherent need to belong, the need to have a job, the feeling of being a necessary part of a cohort group of individuals. In my opinion this game lacks that feeling despite being such an immensely cooperative game. Everyone is a healer, everyone can do damage, everyone can essentially do everything.... that in turn makes me feel like anything I do has no purpose, no meaning, no real significance. I didn't notice it before but this beautifully crafted game suddenly felt as hollow as a Christmas sphere. The game felt like a shell, and suddenly, my entire perception and experience changed. Everything felt empty.  

And so, I left. Just like that, I explained how I felt to my guild...naturally everyone was shocked. I ran the website for the guild and gave all of the necessary information to the GM so that she could appoint someone else to run it. I said my goodbyes and left.

Why am I posting here?

I have no idea, maybe I just want to hear what you guys have to say about my experience.

 I still feel a very huge sense of emptiness when I think of GW2. There is no denying the fact  that I loved the game for 6+ months. I was committed to the game, helped to run my own guild, had spent over 800 hours playing, and had formed a very successful WvW / PvE circle of close friends. The game was an absolutely phenomenal ride while I felt fulfilled, but once I started to really think about the game, once I started to think about my role, my class, my decisions, my choices, I began to realize how little it all mattered. In traditional mmos If I played a healer the entire guild would celebrate (healers are always needed) if I played a Warrior or a Tank I knew that I was responsible for keeping my group alive. It brought about a sense of duty and yes even pride after a successful dungeon run.  All of these things feel missing from Guild Wars 2. What is surprising is that it took me that long to realize it. I guess I was too busy having fun with the game to notice it. It wasn't until that particular moment where I wanted to equip a Great Axe as a warrior and noticed it was not in the game that I began to think about the game's  limitations and discovered how I felt.

So what do you guys think?

Am I nuts?

Are my conclusions legitimate in your opinion?

Has anything like this ever happened to you guys?

I would love to get a discussion going about this because I am really quite perplexed about the whole experience.

Looking forward to reading your replies.

Thanks. 

I am going to give Rohan a shot. I have heard that game is absolute garbage. 

- If you must know why I am looking for this game. I lost a bet, I am to either eat nothing but canned beans for 7 days or play the worst possible  mmo I can find for 15 days.  (Or 150 hours). 

I chose the latter. 

Hiya everyone,

DISCLAMER - This may seem like trolling to you but I assure you that I have my own personal reasons for wanting to experience the absolute worst the mmo world has to offer so please bear wtih me! 

I'm looking for the mmo that no one wants to play.  I want a game that has all of these "qualities" in one way or another ! 

- Poor coustomer Service

- Slow updates / poor game support 

- Really bad cash shop

- Game play heavily dependent on cash shop

- slow grindy tidious leveling

- Bad community 

- poor graphics

- buggy game play

- generic kill X number of Y mob quests 

- poor animations and character models 

- Little to no character customization outside of cash shop

- Massive RMT problem

and last but not least, just an overall game that you would wouldn't be caught dead playing. 

- This is not a joke, nor am I trolling, I am genuinely interested in experiencing the worst possible MMO I can for my own personal reasons. I want to experience the absolute worst  F2P mmorpg that is currently available. The worse the game the more I want to try it. 

Please let me know what game would be the absolute worst to try out. 

Thanks. 

I feel like I have read this threat 3 times in the last 3 years now. 

If I can step away from GW2 for a few months then maybe. I am very curious about the changes that they have made in the past few years. I played the game on it's original release and it was total crap though so I wouldn't expect to much to begin with.

Also, if ARR turns out to be a great game those people who choose to stay with FFXI can basically kiss the long term support of this game goodbye. I really doubt if ARR becomes a massive success ← Which I do not think will happen ← that this game would have to many players remaining. I would go as far as saying that if ARR does everything right FFXI would immediately  take a HUGE hit in subscribers. 

Any word about a release date for this game? I'd like to know if it will release before May or after. If it is before I will likely play the game, if it is after I likely won't be able to so release date is really important for me. 

Thanks. 

I honestly cannot fathom how some people who replied here would make the assertion that DCUO or most of Sony's so called "F2P" games are unfair in comparison to real F2P games. Call me crazy but through my many years of experience with mmos I have seen a lot of F2P games. Games like Atlantica, Sword 2, Rohan online, and Runes of Magic are all perfect examples of what many consider "F2P games". Unfortunately many people don't have the foresight to see what is beyond their noses. When you have a model that is entirely dependent on cash shop purchases, it will almost always be more expensive to compete and to remain significantly competitive in those games than in games like DCUO or other such mmos that are more of an "extended free trial". In games like DCUO the new player's who are not willing to pay will be restricted heavily in favor of a more balanced and fair overall gaming environment at the higher levels. I am sure that most people with significant experience in the end game content of an mmo understands that it is much better to pay $15/mo continuously rather than having to pay significantly more money  through microtransactions to compete at a higher level. It is this a across-the-board fee that keeps the game from becoming one of the many F2P mmos that require you to pay an enormous amount of money to compete. 

Now, is it free to play? Maybe not quite in the definition that most people have of the term. However, it cannot be denied that in most situations games with this kind of model are in the end more balanced, less expensive for most of the "Core" player base, and much more content and update driven rather than "Cash shop sale" driven. If you truly despise this model of payment than I can only think of a handful of reasons why that would be the case. Either you dislike the mislabeling of the term "F2P" and the fact that it significantly limits you as you approach the higher levels of the game. In which case, I can't fault you to much. Or you are ignorant about the true cost of playing and competing in a real "F2P" game environment. You could also have a lot of money and want to get ahead by paying your way to the top...or you could be a person who simply doesn't want to spend a dime in playing mmos. Either way it is hard to make the case that games that have this payment model are in the long run more expensive and less balanced than completely F2P games with a 100% focus on revenue from their microtransactions. The game maybe mislabeled and may in the end try to force a subscription out of you, but that does not make it any less of a fair game for those who decide to invest serious time and effort into the game's content. True F2P mmos are a scam that try to nickle and dime you for more than the basic $15 fee ever will. I guarantee that if you were to make a comparison of the top say, Atlantica players vs. the top DCUO players those playing Atlantica would be spending significantly more money "or in some rare instances just time" than those playing DCUO. 

With Guild wars 2 just released I see no real reason to try this game out again, at least not in the near future. 

I wish them luck, the game always had some potential. 

Originally posted by rissies

Originally posted by Interesting

Too Long Didnt Read Version:

Whole point is to send the message that its not OK to monetize time and effort

 

 

And I stopped right there.

Yes it is ok. Time is worth something. Effort is worth something. It doesn't matter if it's time and effort spent playing a video game, or time and effort spent at an actual job, they both have value. How the value of one is measured against the other depends greatly on the playerbase. Even without a cash shop of any kind, there would still be the translation of real cash to in-game currency through gold and account sellers, like in every other mmo. A cash shop simply represents a more visible, more palatable, and more easily controlled conversion that can directly benefit the game.

 

As a general rule in life, it's usually wise to read something fully before making an assessment.