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Reviewers Pile On World Of Warcraft Beta
Thanks to GameSpy for its 'Pile On!' feature discussing Beta impressions so far on Blizzard's long-awaited MMO title, World Of Warcraft. Reactions range from the effusive ("I'm more convinced than ever that this game may finally be the first truly mass-market MMO") through the delighted ("I'm... completely in love with World of Warcraft"), to the ecstatic ("World of Warcraft delivers just what people are expecting: a tight, fun MMOG from a trusted developer.") Elsewhere, a WorldOfWarcraft.com forum discussion has a Blizzard representative mentioning release estimates of early this summer are likely wrong: "Definitely not July. As you know, we never set release dates, but you can expect the beta to run for another 5+ months." But, more importantly, does anyone _not_ like World Of Warcraft?
One of the largest point that seems to stick against people who I game with is that there doesn't seem to be any PVP. I can see it being implemented, but it's just not the competitive game that most people I game with want. Of course, the people I game with are in no case any type of standard or majority, so our opinions don't really count.
How to Speak Leet
The Devs have commented that they will be raising the level cap as they complete enough areas/mobs/quests for that level to be fun. If I remember correctly they said they didn't have quite enough dungeons previously to put the cap up.
They plan to raise the level cap to 35 for the next push. With 5 months to go, I'm sure they will have plenty of time to raise the cap to the same level they plan on having it set for retail.
This is why i really like City of Heros, which allows the user to "sidekick" someone that is 5 or more levels lower than them. It raises the "sidekicks" attack level to 1 or 2 levels lower than the mentor. Thus allowing someone who is much higher level to still play with their low level friend
I honestly can't remember if this was something I read in a preview somewhere, or in a "Some game should include this" rant somewhere. (I feel like it might have been the latter, and on Penny Arcade.)
A nifty sollution to the problem of not being able to play with higher level friends would be the ability to do temporary apprenticship with higher lever characters. Say a level 10 hooks up with their friend, who has been playing longer and is a leve 30. The level 10 would get some sort of temporary stats and skills bumps, putting them to the equivilant of level (say) 20 or 25. Combined with a game written to allow characters within 5 or 10 level of each other to work effectively together, this would allow lower level characters to still play with higher level characters, and gain experience from it - suitably modified so they get a reasonable amount for a level 10 character and not a level 20 or 25 character.
Thinking out lout now, the system could even be built so the level 10 character doesn't imediatly jump to a temporary level 25 upon apprenticing with their friend, but does it over the course of 5 or 10 minutes, and it can only be done (for example) 6 hours out of every 24. This allows friends to still play together for (what I think) is a very reasonable amount of time, but not abuse it by having tons of level 1s running around with level 99s.
Just some thoughts. Sorry I don't know remember where the origonal idea came from, cuz it's not mine.
-Trillian
...is that they build staircases to nowhere. ...and then what? In Diablo's case, you move on to Nightmare and Hell. The exact same game, only with tougher monsters and phatter lewt. You keep leveling and finding cool shit, so for a while its OK. But eventually you beat the game a second and third time. Then what? Keep looking for phatter lewt and more levels! So you start with the Meph runs and Pindle runs and Baal runs. Over and over and over, all in the search for more levels and the uberest gear in the land.
This hit me hardest with Diablo 2 (+LOD). You start off, the game is great, everything is new and exciting, skills, equipment, quests... you're completely wowed by it all. You keep playing, and quests start to become rehashes of other quests (eg: Kill x, find y, bring item to z), but you keep playing because you're still leveling and finding new and exciting gear. And then, the magical night comes: You beat the game. Congrats! A winnar is yuo!
I used to be mad into Diablo, always looking for the perfect character and the l33test equipment setup. And then one day I realized just what I was doing, and how pathetic it was. I'd willingly jumped off the campaign, the grand staircase, right into a pit of boring and stupid. Fortunatly for Blizzard, their druglike secret formula is frequently strong enough to keep players splashing around in a shithole post-game indefinitly. But eventually I looked around and realized where I was, what I was doing, and how Bliz had duped me into getting there. And I guarantee you I will not be going back.
Which is why i'm concerned about WoW, and why I have yet to subscribe to a MMORPG. Now i'm sure Blizzard will craft a masterful MMORPG and a great story, and reviewers will shower the game with praise... but as long as Blizzard (and indeed, most MMORPGs) continue to neglect the giant question-mark that is the post-game, I won't willingly fork over ANY of my cash for their game(s). Bliz could create their best collection of quests yet, but as long as the game still remains a staircase to nowhere... i'm not climbing it. Sorry Bliz.