OP you still haven't changed the last paragraph? Yeah this will be the last review I read from you. 

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by Vaultar

Originally posted by Sameer1979

EA  is simply publishing the game, they don't own Funcom or have anything to do with development of the game. So if this game ends up as a failure or dead it will be all Funcom not EA. This is not like BW / EA where name BW is just an illussion and all strings are pulled by EA.

Funcom is still independent company. EA is handling only sales and distribution, nothing more.

The fact remains that EA sets hard deadlines for the game companies it owns even when games aren't polished or completed. You can bet your bottom dollar that this will affect the quality of this game when it gets released. 

 

I will just highlight the part because you clearly missed it.

I am sorry that is my mistake. However, that does not take the fact away that Funcom is naturally following release date set by EA. 

Originally posted by Vaultar

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by Vaultar

Originally posted by Sameer1979

EA  is simply publishing the game, they don't own Funcom or have anything to do with development of the game. So if this game ends up as a failure or dead it will be all Funcom not EA. This is not like BW / EA where name BW is just an illussion and all strings are pulled by EA.

Funcom is still independent company. EA is handling only sales and distribution, nothing more.

The fact remains that EA sets hard deadlines for the game companies it owns even when games aren't polished or completed. You can bet your bottom dollar that this will affect the quality of this game when it gets released. 

 

I will just highlight the part because you clearly missed it.

I am sorry that is my mistake. However, that does not take the fact away that Funcom is naturally following release date set by EA. 

how do you know?

Originally posted by Vaultar

Originally posted by Sameer1979

Originally posted by Vaultar

Originally posted by Sameer1979

EA  is simply publishing the game, they don't own Funcom or have anything to do with development of the game. So if this game ends up as a failure or dead it will be all Funcom not EA. This is not like BW / EA where name BW is just an illussion and all strings are pulled by EA.

Funcom is still independent company. EA is handling only sales and distribution, nothing more.

The fact remains that EA sets hard deadlines for the game companies it owns even when games aren't polished or completed. You can bet your bottom dollar that this will affect the quality of this game when it gets released. 

 

I will just highlight the part because you clearly missed it.

I am sorry that is my mistake. However, that does not take the fact away that Funcom is naturally following release date set by EA. 

Why would that be?  EA hasn't invested in the game, they get their cut no matter when it releases.

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

First, I'd like to say welcome to the end of the world! It's full of zombies, crows, and involuntary smexing teleportation time-space-warpination. I think I should forewarn you that I don't exactly have a very high expectation for the game and went into all of the beta's with that mindset. "I don't expect much, so I'm bound to be surprised by something!" Which I feel is the best way to go into any situation and will yield the least biased view. Alright, with that out of the we, on to the nitty gritty!

THE NITTY GRITTY

The Secret World is a modern day - all your nightmares from childhood are true - there is no santaclause - and the easter bunny is a large black man in a bunny suit MMO featuring a vast world, beautiful graphics, more skill combinations than a 7 year old can count. I think that's what the back of the box will say...What TSW actually is is a really big world made for a specific niche. I suppose this is a good thing and is probably what Funcom wanted, but what about those who aren't in that niche? Do they just have to miss out on, what might be, a spectacular game? Well maybe I'm stepping in some direction I shouldn't but I guess only time will tell who the game attracts, no?

So in The Secret World you are dropped into hell ! The walls are closing in around you and some asian girl goes down on you, or something like that. Each faction has its own beginning sequence that projects them into a specific event, generally a past event. That event serves as the tutorial for the player. Though it doesn't do all that great a job of teaching as it assumes you know a thing or two about MMO's. I can see new MMO players having a hard time getting their hands dirty in this. And it wasn't just that initial tutorial, just about everything designed to teach did a fairly poor job of doing so. Eventually the information was conveyed, but it took far too much effort for someone learning to play. Once you got the ball rolling everything was smooth sailing.

OMG, GODRAYS!

The Secret World is probably one of the most beautifully rendered games I've seen in a long while. Granted there are other upcoming MMO's that stack up against it and some that far surpass it (GW2, Tera, Blade and Soul, Archage), but for being made on the source engine it does an incredible job of presenting strong visuals and giving the feeling of "we're all going to die!" My only complaint with the graphics was the color pallete. It got very tiresome after a few hours of play. Looking at grays, light blue hues, and whatever vomit color the zombie flesh was just put you in a depressed mood after a little while. Or maybe I should go take some crazy pills and be happy about the end of the world.

All of the post processing effects and environmental shaders fired off without any issues. The DX11 client seemed to be stable, atleast from what I expereienced, and the particles were some of the best I've seen in an MMO. Ofcourse there was the occasional glitch here and there, very rare, and some models didn't load immediately, but then again it is in beta.

WORLD OF LEFT4DEADCRAFT

So after stumbling my way through the tutorials I found myself in Kingsmouth a zombie infested town featuring that typical small town sheriff, the psychic who totally saw this sh*t coming, the guy who'd rather hold himself up in his junkyard where he'll surely die, and the badass old woman and her shotgun. Zombies everywhere, dead bodies, and whatever that thing with 6 legs was wandered aimlessly around the town eating...everything. I though, "Oh cool! Zombies", until I got 6 hours and and found myself saying, "Oh...more zombies." Zombies are cool and all, but they're only fun for abuot an hour or two before it's time to turn off Left4Dead...I mean...The Secret World and play some Skyrim or something. It wouldn't be so much of a complaint if we weren't forced into this area for god knows how many hours... Even if you made it to the Savage Coast you were still bombarded with countless zombies. Whats more is they had huge aggro ranges that you couldnt see. So you just HAD to fight your way through the zombie armies to do something as simple as "go talk to this guy over there". It got tiresome and old very quickly. Now theres nothing wrong with bustin' a cap in a few zombies every now and then, but this was a bit overboard. I know I shouldn't be comparing TSW to L4D, but the fact that they're made with the same engine and play very similarly really doesn't help the counter-argument.

DIE DAMNIT, DIE!

The Secret World is hard! Yeah, It's really hard...like really really hard! And I don't mean hard as in difficult, I mean hard as in you're going to die alot and for unnecessary reasons. Now this same thing as mentioned about another MMO (yeah I'm about to bring it up...) Guild Wars 2, But the difference here is that Guild Wars 2 was difficult within reason. Things were challenging but not impossible to kill in some regards. TSW really doesn't do much to be difficult its just impossible in some cases. It's like the developers said "hey lets make this thing deal 13409127482387 damage and the player 2000 hp...Good Luck!" There were a few mobs in particular that made me sit and think about it. The Old School Magus'. You run into one of those and you might as well just die and respawn. Especially in one of the solo instances, where everytime you picked up an item off the tables they spawned. I ended up just taking the items, spawning them, dying, and running back to get the next item. On top of that the dodge function didn't do a whole lot to get you out of danger (here it comes again) Guild Wars 2's dodge function actually gets you away, like a dodge should. Hmm let me rephrase that; the dodge gets you out of the way, but the enemies move so fast that it doesn't matter.

"Dodge! ...oh you're right in front of me again...WHAT!?! I can't dodge again for how long!?!"

Alright let me pause: So far it seems like I've thrown a lot of negativity at this game. This isn't really the case, I'm just outlining the concerns. The game is really a great game these few things are just holding it down mroe than anything else.

THE SKILLS ON THE WHEEL GO ROUND AND ROUND...

So TSW features this skill wheel....thingy. Basically you have at your disposal all of the available skills, only so many can fit on your bar, and you are free to put your skill points into whatever parts of the wheel you want; Whether it be shotgun, piston, blade, or one of the various magics(and whatever else was there). A friend of mine gave this system a very interesting name; he called it "Noob-repellant system". Essentially this is similar to the Guild Wars 1 system, except its on a wheel and you have access to all of the [classes] skills. There are so many combinations for so many differen't builds that there are quite a few who will put together a noob build. A good example is the build that was displayed inside the GW1 box, I'm sure we all know it, that was tested and proven to be absolutely horrible and was openly mocked by Arenanet. What this does is ward off noobs who will likely thing "Wow this skill system sucks!" when in actuality they just couldn't get a good build together. Thus we shall call it Noob Repellant.

The skill system itself is actually prettintuitive, there's a sort of tiering system that helps the player get into a niche and not have their skill set too far spread out. Players can place skill points literally wherever they choose. There are no restrictions to tell you "oh you have blade..you can't have pistol too!" So the player is free to create whatever character they want. Of course we'll see what we always see. Some super build will be created by some guy named xxTrollzoRxx or something and then everyone will use that build...because it 'works the best'. It will become the META and then it will be Build Wars all over again...okay maybe not all that extreme, but theres always that possibility. Some can argue, "oh that wont happen! Not to my game!", but its not the games its the gamer. Gamers will always want a way to standardize things. it's so they know what to expect. And generally if someone kills you with something a lot you tend to want to know what it was...and you'll most likely adopt it(or call it hax).

The skill system they have in place is a stellar system thats bound to turn heads and be a huge selling point for the game. Of course you will have noobs, not even Raptor  Jesus can stop the coming of the noobs, but atleast you have the freedom to be a noob and not have to sit on rails and follow the guy infront of you down a skill tree.

THE NEVERENDING STORY

The Secret World showcases some of the best story-telling, voice acting, and script writing in the genre! Okay, maybe not TAHT good, but it is pretty impressive. You feel like the person doing the talking is alive and is passionate about what they're saying. Characters feel life-like, and have deep rich personalities. All of the cutscenes did an incredible job of pushing the story forward and giving you a sense of mystery and making you want to go on and find out whats at the end of the trail covered in blood and dead kittens. Though some may not agree with the high volume of perverse overtones, and being groped by fairies, but it only serves to add to the universe. If something happens a certain way, it happens for a reason.

Now there is one major complaint that I share with many others. You have no choice in most things that happen to you. If you watch any cutscene in the game, your character stands there looking bewildered as some guy talks to you about how the bad guys are taking the hobbits to Isengard. Moreover, you never say anything. You just stand there and take whatever pre-scripted verbal abuse is thrown at you. Some one could come in throwing used condoms at you and your character probably wouldn't move. The lack of choice is a bit unnerving and makes you feel like you have no control over the outcome of your game experience. From there the game begins to feel more like an 'on rails' MMO than anything else it may be labeled with.

Though the story is well written and delivered on the best way possible, it just feels...lacking. I, personally, think giving the player a choice of responses, or maybe giving the player dialogue might increase immersion a bit. Even if the player cant choose what he/she says just having a voice means a lot to the player.

BOOM! HEADSHOT!

The combat in the game feels a bit akward and unpolished, but I'll attribute that to the game being in beta. Attacking enemies doesnt feel fulfilling, nor do you feel powerful. You don't feel as though you're making contact with the enemy when you cast spells and the only time you 'feel' the impact is if you have a gun of some sort and even then its hit or miss. The combat was simply underwhelming, though it did its job and served its purpose quite well, you just didn't feel as powerful as you would like.

Someone mentioned a few days ago that you are part of a whole, a small cog in a larger machine, part of one of three secret societies. The power of a single individual may not be as important as the goals of the whole. As well, there aren't really any 'heroes' as everyone is on the same playing field and all the same rank; So no one is intrinsically special.

CUT IT DOWN WITH...A HERRING!!

This section will be a bit short. I know The Secret World has no levels and no classes, but how on earth am I supposed to know what is okay and not okay to fight. Sure there's somewhat of a system in place to help you make the determination, but it's not all that effective. Especially when the game pushes you into this area that you have to do a quest in and you suddenly realize that the things here are kicking your arse. There's not a very clear way to tell the player..."don't do that...he shoots lazers...and they hurt"

GAMEOVER MAN...GAMEOVER

The Secret World is a pretty awesome game, if you don't mind looking at ruined cities and zombies corpses all day, and is bound to draw its own crowd and be a moderate success, but it has many flaws that I can only hope are adressed before release, but then again..... it's EA and we see what happened with Star Wars: The Old Republic (yeah, i said it). Let's hope EA doesn't suck the life out of another company, though there wasn't a whole lot of life left in Funcom. Hmm maybe EA should've been in the game too?

"EA's conspiracy to take out all the other game companies and then take over the gaming WORLD! Next target....Blizzard, MWAHAHAHAHAHA!"

 

-Cheers

Edit: cupcakes

 

Funcom used the Dreamworld engine for TSW, while Left4Dead uses the source engine.  Also, why would EA suck the life out of funcom?  Their role as publisher is to make sure the game gets distributed properly.  They don't own Funcom or really have anything to do with them other than getting boxes on shelves.

Originally posted by bcbully

OP you still haven't changed the last paragraph? Yeah this will be the last review I read from you. 

Well, why should I change it if nothing wrong was said (though that may be a matter of perspective). Was the paragraph a bit harsh? Sure, but not far from the truth. EA sets unreasonable deadlines for companies that it 'controls' (using the term control loosely), and has been on a development studio shopping spree; buying up every studio it can get its hands on. Whether or not its inherently EA's fault the games don't do as well as expected is left to debate.

Here's an example. Let's say I had a development studio called Snowstorm and we started on a game called World of Battlecraft..EA offers us 3.5 bagillion dollars. Being an underfunded independent company looking for a big break, we take the money and run screaming "we're rich!" 2 months later as were entering alpha stages and the game is 25% done EA comes back and says "Oh, hey we want that game out and on the market in 10 days...kthxbai." We'd all look around at each other, our team of a whopping 8 people, and in a panic finish the game with some stuff we threw together. We'd sit around our coffee table and start thinking of how we can finish the game in patches.

Of course it's never that extreme and I'm sure no one is getting bagillions of dollars from EA(is that even a number?), but it's not far off from what might actually happen. Of course from where I stand, not being a development studio, it's all speculation and dart throwing.

And also, let me clerify something. I wasn't attempting to say that the game was nothing but a zombie shoot-em-up, but that they have a fairly large presence in the game world and that it became tiresome after a short while. Variety is a thing that is subjectively enjoyed.

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

First, I'd like to say welcome to the end of the world! It's full of zombies, crows, and involuntary smexing teleportation time-space-warpination. I think I should forewarn you that I don't exactly have a very high expectation for the game and went into all of the beta's with that mindset. "I don't expect much, so I'm bound to be surprised by something!" Which I feel is the best way to go into any situation and will yield the least biased view. Alright, with that out of the we, on to the nitty gritty!

THE NITTY GRITTY

The Secret World is a modern day - all your nightmares from childhood are true - there is no santaclause - and the easter bunny is a large black man in a bunny suit MMO featuring a vast world, beautiful graphics, more skill combinations than a 7 year old can count. I think that's what the back of the box will say...What TSW actually is is a really big world made for a specific niche. I suppose this is a good thing and is probably what Funcom wanted, but what about those who aren't in that niche? Do they just have to miss out on, what might be, a spectacular game? Well maybe I'm stepping in some direction I shouldn't but I guess only time will tell who the game attracts, no?

So in The Secret World you are dropped into hell ! The walls are closing in around you and some asian girl goes down on you, or something like that. Each faction has its own beginning sequence that projects them into a specific event, generally a past event. That event serves as the tutorial for the player. Though it doesn't do all that great a job of teaching as it assumes you know a thing or two about MMO's. I can see new MMO players having a hard time getting their hands dirty in this. And it wasn't just that initial tutorial, just about everything designed to teach did a fairly poor job of doing so. Eventually the information was conveyed, but it took far too much effort for someone learning to play. Once you got the ball rolling everything was smooth sailing.

OMG, GODRAYS!

The Secret World is probably one of the most beautifully rendered games I've seen in a long while. Granted there are other upcoming MMO's that stack up against it and some that far surpass it (GW2, Tera, Blade and Soul, Archage), but for being made on the source engine it does an incredible job of presenting strong visuals and giving the feeling of "we're all going to die!" My only complaint with the graphics was the color pallete. It got very tiresome after a few hours of play. Looking at grays, light blue hues, and whatever vomit color the zombie flesh was just put you in a depressed mood after a little while. Or maybe I should go take some crazy pills and be happy about the end of the world.

All of the post processing effects and environmental shaders fired off without any issues. The DX11 client seemed to be stable, atleast from what I expereienced, and the particles were some of the best I've seen in an MMO. Ofcourse there was the occasional glitch here and there, very rare, and some models didn't load immediately, but then again it is in beta.

WORLD OF LEFT4DEADCRAFT

So after stumbling my way through the tutorials I found myself in Kingsmouth a zombie infested town featuring that typical small town sheriff, the psychic who totally saw this sh*t coming, the guy who'd rather hold himself up in his junkyard where he'll surely die, and the badass old woman and her shotgun. Zombies everywhere, dead bodies, and whatever that thing with 6 legs was wandered aimlessly around the town eating...everything. I though, "Oh cool! Zombies", until I got 6 hours and and found myself saying, "Oh...more zombies." Zombies are cool and all, but they're only fun for abuot an hour or two before it's time to turn off Left4Dead...I mean...The Secret World and play some Skyrim or something. It wouldn't be so much of a complaint if we weren't forced into this area for god knows how many hours... Even if you made it to the Savage Coast you were still bombarded with countless zombies. Whats more is they had huge aggro ranges that you couldnt see. So you just HAD to fight your way through the zombie armies to do something as simple as "go talk to this guy over there". It got tiresome and old very quickly. Now theres nothing wrong with bustin' a cap in a few zombies every now and then, but this was a bit overboard. I know I shouldn't be comparing TSW to L4D, but the fact that they're made with the same engine and play very similarly really doesn't help the counter-argument.

DIE DAMNIT, DIE!

The Secret World is hard! Yeah, It's really hard...like really really hard! And I don't mean hard as in difficult, I mean hard as in you're going to die alot and for unnecessary reasons. Now this same thing as mentioned about another MMO (yeah I'm about to bring it up...) Guild Wars 2, But the difference here is that Guild Wars 2 was difficult within reason. Things were challenging but not impossible to kill in some regards. TSW really doesn't do much to be difficult its just impossible in some cases. It's like the developers said "hey lets make this thing deal 13409127482387 damage and the player 2000 hp...Good Luck!" There were a few mobs in particular that made me sit and think about it. The Old School Magus'. You run into one of those and you might as well just die and respawn. Especially in one of the solo instances, where everytime you picked up an item off the tables they spawned. I ended up just taking the items, spawning them, dying, and running back to get the next item. On top of that the dodge function didn't do a whole lot to get you out of danger (here it comes again) Guild Wars 2's dodge function actually gets you away, like a dodge should. Hmm let me rephrase that; the dodge gets you out of the way, but the enemies move so fast that it doesn't matter.

"Dodge! ...oh you're right in front of me again...WHAT!?! I can't dodge again for how long!?!"

Alright let me pause: So far it seems like I've thrown a lot of negativity at this game. This isn't really the case, I'm just outlining the concerns. The game is really a great game these few things are just holding it down mroe than anything else.

THE SKILLS ON THE WHEEL GO ROUND AND ROUND...

So TSW features this skill wheel....thingy. Basically you have at your disposal all of the available skills, only so many can fit on your bar, and you are free to put your skill points into whatever parts of the wheel you want; Whether it be shotgun, piston, blade, or one of the various magics(and whatever else was there). A friend of mine gave this system a very interesting name; he called it "Noob-repellant system". Essentially this is similar to the Guild Wars 1 system, except its on a wheel and you have access to all of the [classes] skills. There are so many combinations for so many differen't builds that there are quite a few who will put together a noob build. A good example is the build that was displayed inside the GW1 box, I'm sure we all know it, that was tested and proven to be absolutely horrible and was openly mocked by Arenanet. What this does is ward off noobs who will likely thing "Wow this skill system sucks!" when in actuality they just couldn't get a good build together. Thus we shall call it Noob Repellant.

The skill system itself is actually prettintuitive, there's a sort of tiering system that helps the player get into a niche and not have their skill set too far spread out. Players can place skill points literally wherever they choose. There are no restrictions to tell you "oh you have blade..you can't have pistol too!" So the player is free to create whatever character they want. Of course we'll see what we always see. Some super build will be created by some guy named xxTrollzoRxx or something and then everyone will use that build...because it 'works the best'. It will become the META and then it will be Build Wars all over again...okay maybe not all that extreme, but theres always that possibility. Some can argue, "oh that wont happen! Not to my game!", but its not the games its the gamer. Gamers will always want a way to standardize things. it's so they know what to expect. And generally if someone kills you with something a lot you tend to want to know what it was...and you'll most likely adopt it(or call it hax).

The skill system they have in place is a stellar system thats bound to turn heads and be a huge selling point for the game. Of course you will have noobs, not even Raptor  Jesus can stop the coming of the noobs, but atleast you have the freedom to be a noob and not have to sit on rails and follow the guy infront of you down a skill tree.

THE NEVERENDING STORY

The Secret World showcases some of the best story-telling, voice acting, and script writing in the genre! Okay, maybe not TAHT good, but it is pretty impressive. You feel like the person doing the talking is alive and is passionate about what they're saying. Characters feel life-like, and have deep rich personalities. All of the cutscenes did an incredible job of pushing the story forward and giving you a sense of mystery and making you want to go on and find out whats at the end of the trail covered in blood and dead kittens. Though some may not agree with the high volume of perverse overtones, and being groped by fairies, but it only serves to add to the universe. If something happens a certain way, it happens for a reason.

Now there is one major complaint that I share with many others. You have no choice in most things that happen to you. If you watch any cutscene in the game, your character stands there looking bewildered as some guy talks to you about how the bad guys are taking the hobbits to Isengard. Moreover, you never say anything. You just stand there and take whatever pre-scripted verbal abuse is thrown at you. Some one could come in throwing used condoms at you and your character probably wouldn't move. The lack of choice is a bit unnerving and makes you feel like you have no control over the outcome of your game experience. From there the game begins to feel more like an 'on rails' MMO than anything else it may be labeled with.

Though the story is well written and delivered on the best way possible, it just feels...lacking. I, personally, think giving the player a choice of responses, or maybe giving the player dialogue might increase immersion a bit. Even if the player cant choose what he/she says just having a voice means a lot to the player.

BOOM! HEADSHOT!

The combat in the game feels a bit akward and unpolished, but I'll attribute that to the game being in beta. Attacking enemies doesnt feel fulfilling, nor do you feel powerful. You don't feel as though you're making contact with the enemy when you cast spells and the only time you 'feel' the impact is if you have a gun of some sort and even then its hit or miss. The combat was simply underwhelming, though it did its job and served its purpose quite well, you just didn't feel as powerful as you would like.

Someone mentioned a few days ago that you are part of a whole, a small cog in a larger machine, part of one of three secret societies. The power of a single individual may not be as important as the goals of the whole. As well, there aren't really any 'heroes' as everyone is on the same playing field and all the same rank; So no one is intrinsically special.

CUT IT DOWN WITH...A HERRING!!

This section will be a bit short. I know The Secret World has no levels and no classes, but how on earth am I supposed to know what is okay and not okay to fight. Sure there's somewhat of a system in place to help you make the determination, but it's not all that effective. Especially when the game pushes you into this area that you have to do a quest in and you suddenly realize that the things here are kicking your arse. There's not a very clear way to tell the player..."don't do that...he shoots lazers...and they hurt"

GAMEOVER MAN...GAMEOVER

The Secret World is a pretty awesome game, if you don't mind looking at ruined cities and zombies corpses all day, and is bound to draw its own crowd and be a moderate success, but it has many flaws that I can only hope are adressed before release, but then again..... it's EA and we see what happened with Star Wars: The Old Republic (yeah, i said it). Let's hope EA doesn't suck the life out of another company, though there wasn't a whole lot of life left in Funcom. Hmm maybe EA should've been in the game too?

"EA's conspiracy to take out all the other game companies and then take over the gaming WORLD! Next target....Blizzard, MWAHAHAHAHAHA!"

 

-Cheers

Edit: cupcakes

 

Funcom used the Dreamworld engine for TSW, while Left4Dead uses the source engine.  Also, why would EA suck the life out of funcom?  Their role as publisher is to make sure the game gets distributed properly.  They don't own Funcom or really have anything to do with them other than getting boxes on shelves.

What's funny is...I did some research before I wrote that part, and I said in my head "Don't write Source write Dreamworld"...and you know what, I still put that it was done on the source engine. Haha! At any rate, edited.

Better graphics in GW2 and Tera?  Your nuts. And im a big fan of TERA especially its graphics.

Originally posted by Crunchy221

Better graphics in GW2 and Tera?  Your nuts. And im a big fan of TERA especially its graphics.

If you read closely it says "Granted there are other upcoming MMO's that stack up against it and some that far surpass it". I dont specify which mmo's do which so it's left up to the reader to decide which game looks better. Me specifying game A looks better than game B could raise more eyebrows than the statement that was actually made.

Originally posted by Soandsoso

Originally posted by Boldyn

The old school magus npc's hit hard, but not even remotly close to what you describe as impossible and poorly designed by the devs. A matter of spec/knowledge of gameplay without a doubt. Or a case of your character not being setup for that areas "level" of mobs

I had no issue with them either. I stopped reading after this.

The fact that it's even possible for players to accidently gimp their character in relation to appropriate content is poor game design.

The rest of each post I quoted is typical e-peen drivel 

Originally posted by Crunchy221

Better graphics in GW2 and Tera?  Your nuts. And im a big fan of TERA especially its graphics.

Only DX11 game and yes with a DX11 card the graphic are much better than those two listed games. Tera is much better than GW2 however.

Good Write up overall, except for the EA statement and for the zillionth time, if people don't know yet as one poster put it  (EA  is simply publishing the game, they don't own Funcom or have anything to do with development of the game).

Cheers,

Faulkner

Originally posted by Thorbrand

Originally posted by Crunchy221

Better graphics in GW2 and Tera?  Your nuts. And im a big fan of TERA especially its graphics.

Only DX11 game and yes with a DX11 card the graphic are much better than those two listed games. Tera is much better than GW2 however.

From a technology standpoint, yes TSW is far superior to the games listed. But from a visual standpoint, as in which game is the most pleasing to the eye(granted this is mostly personal opinion and will vary from person to person) I think the games listed have much more appeal. Theres a wide range of colors in each, the art styles are unique for each title (including TSW), and theres a bit more visual information being delivered.

Sure it can be said that TSW does more shader-wise and brings more things through your graphics pipeline, but to what avail? I'll be honest and say I wasn't all that impressed with character models. I felt the creation process was fairly shallow and didn't allow for a lot of creativity. In fact you were restricted in looks based on the faction you chose. If you chose dragon you looked asian; no if, ands, or buts about it. I did however like the 'business casual' look of the templars.

So, who is on top graphically? It's all a matter of personal opinion. TSW may be DX11, but this argument could go down the same road as the Crysis 2 vs Battlefield 3 graphics argument. God knows where that will end.

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

Originally posted by bcbully

OP you still haven't changed the last paragraph? Yeah this will be the last review I read from you. 

Well, why should I change it if nothing wrong was said (though that may be a matter of perspective). Was the paragraph a bit harsh? Sure, but not far from the truth. EA sets unreasonable deadlines for companies that it 'controls' (using the term control loosely), and has been on a development studio shopping spree; buying up every studio it can get its hands on. Whether or not its inherently EA's fault the games don't do as well as expected is left to debate.

Here's an example. Let's say I had a development studio called Snowstorm and we started on a game called World of Battlecraft..EA offers us 3.5 bagillion dollars. Being an underfunded independent company looking for a big break, we take the money and run screaming "we're rich!" 2 months later as were entering alpha stages and the game is 25% done EA comes back and says "Oh, hey we want that game out and on the market in 10 days...kthxbai." We'd all look around at each other, our team of a whopping 8 people, and in a panic finish the game with some stuff we threw together. We'd sit around our coffee table and start thinking of how we can finish the game in patches.

Of course it's never that extreme and I'm sure no one is getting bagillions of dollars from EA(is that even a number?), but it's not far off from what might actually happen. Of course from where I stand, not being a development studio, it's all speculation and dart throwing.

And also, let me clerify something. I wasn't attempting to say that the game was nothing but a zombie shoot-em-up, but that they have a fairly large presence in the game world and that it became tiresome after a short while. Variety is a thing that is subjectively enjoyed.

As far as I have read funcom didn't get any money from EA.  EA gets their cut from publishing no matter when the game launches, so I don't see why EA's publishing is even relavent.  I guess it would be to those out there that refuse to have anything to do with EA (which there are probably a fair amount of).  But they don't have any kind of involvement of the type you are saying in your post.  

TERA had some of the best graphics ever but TSW's environments are top notch. They boast not only a realism (real world settings) but standing out from all the fantasy graphics we've seen in games for the past decade.

TERA is a prettier game. TSW's graphics are more refreshing.

I'd say TSW's art team is top-notch. (Not speaking so much for their modeling/animation guys).

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

Originally posted by bcbully

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As far as I have read funcom didn't get any money from EA.  EA gets their cut from publishing no matter when the game launches, so I don't see why EA's publishing is even relavent.  I guess it would be to those out there that refuse to have anything to do with EA (which there are probably a fair amount of).  But they don't have any kind of involvement of the type you are saying in your post.  

Truth is no one can truly know as that information may never be disclosed to us, but what we can do is use our logic. If you had some product you were working on would you turn to your friend, who has done nothing to contribute, and say "hey, buddy, wanna split this 50/50?" They would have to have given something to get something out of it. And if you were someone investing in something wouldn't you want it completed in a timely manner? What most people forget is that at the end of the day EA is a business. And as a business they are in the business of doing business. Shake all the important hands and money goes in certain directions.

and whats more is to co produce something, rights to a name or a product have to be bought at some point.

This is one of the better reviews I've seen of this game - it's very well written and I agree with most of your points. Good job! :)

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

Originally posted by bcbully

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As far as I have read funcom didn't get any money from EA.  EA gets their cut from publishing no matter when the game launches, so I don't see why EA's publishing is even relavent.  I guess it would be to those out there that refuse to have anything to do with EA (which there are probably a fair amount of).  But they don't have any kind of involvement of the type you are saying in your post.  

Truth is no one can truly know as that information may never be disclosed to us, but what we can do is use our logic. If you had some product you were working on would you turn to your friend, who has done nothing to contribute, and say "hey, buddy, wanna split this 50/50?" They would have to have given something to get something out of it. And if you were someone investing in something wouldn't you want it completed in a timely manner? What most people forget is that at the end of the day EA is a business. And as a business they are in the business of doing business. Shake all the important hands and money goes in certain directions.

and whats more is to co produce something, rights to a name or a product have to be bought at some point.

Publishers get something out of it by taking a cut of the sale.  We would know because funcom is a publicly traded company and would have to disclose this information.

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

Originally posted by niceguy3978

Originally posted by MMO_REVIEWER

Originally posted by bcbully

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Publishers get something out of it by taking a cut of the sale.  We would know because funcom is a publicly traded company and would have to disclose this information.

sure its publicly traded, but only so much of the company is transparent. You may see money going in either direction, but whether that money is used to fund the game or used for something else on the back end is (???).

Things brighten up quite a bit when you leave Solomon Island and go to Egypt.  I find it odd that some people get tired of killing zombies.. when zombies are mostly in the first part of the game.

I think once more screenshots come out (and after release where not everything is so focused on Solomon Island) more people will see that the game isn't just a dreary dark zombie killer but a really smart, sharp game that requires you to think about what you're doing.  The lore in the entire game is amazing... more so the fact that a lot of it is really tied to lore of human history.

Anyway, I disagree with a large portion of your review because I've been playing closed beta for almost 8 months.  I'm happy in knowing what the game is and what the future holds and purchased my lifetime sub a long time ago.