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The Call On Lord of the Rings Online
The Beta has been going on for some time now, and for all intents and purposes Lord of the Rings Online has launched. Pre-order players will be able to move their characters to the live game when the title officially lights up on April 24th, and commentators on Massively Multiplayer games have weighed in. Their opinion, generally, is unanimous: buy it. Tobold contributes a full-on review, as does CVG. AFK Gamer doesn't go in for such long-form opinions, but he still has a lot to say. Specifically, Foton comments on the good, the okay, and the bad, as well as a few words on the game's (somewhat out of the ordinary) classes. "[The game is] deep and broad. An MMOG, any MMOG, with its premium box price and its premium subscription prices, needs to offer more activities than: you can kill stuff, and, umm, you can kill other players, and umm, you could check the auctions/trade channel. There's many ways to screw around in this MMOG: Deeds, accomplishments, exploration (easy to outrun higher level mobs), titles, player-made music, engaging quest text, a solid start to the crafting system, MONSTER PLAY!!! There's probably more, but that's all I've tried so far."
The link to the full review is wrong. It links to a youtube video of a timelapse of the Wikipedia page on the VT shootings.
The intro was great. (as an elf) I got popped into my own little instance where a battle was taking place. I was ordered to slay goblins, how to move about the world, how to interact with NPC's (kinda like EQ's Mines of Gloomingdeep). After the event you get ported out of your instance, standing where you had stood.
... it was more drawn out even at the lower stages ... but that's not saying much. I fear the game will only really hold for the hardcore LOTR fans, and the rest will play awhile and say 'meh'. And there is always the fear of them f*cking it over someday like SOE did with Star Wars Online. (I'm a huge SW fan; however I couldn't bring myself to play the MMO, even though I was a huge MMO fan, because I knew something, someday, would go wrong and wreck my experiance ... )
The intro really impressed me. Along with the $199 lifetime subscription. And the way they worked classes (trying to stay true to the era but still incorporating the archetypes people are familiar with: for example the minstrel is a healer... you get your healer but recast into something that would fit in to LOTR). But beyond that, I'm not so sure the game will stand the tests of time. One the problems I forsee is the limited number of races. I also liked combat a bit more than WoW
And with that being said 'There's only one Return, and its not of the King, its of the Jedi' -Clerks 2.
The third FA puts it best:
"If you're still playing World of Warcraft and loving it, stick with WoW."
"If you're looking to add to your online gaming options, this game is a fine choice. Beautiful, engaging, deep, different."
"Between online games? Without a doubt, buy it."
That's true. Is it better than WoW? No. Is it worth trying if you're against WoW? Yeah.
I do also have to disagree about how the Tolkeen-y-ness of it all makes it somehow automatically better. Do I really need a deep backstory for my 'kill ten boars' quest? Not really. And because I skipped reading that, I also skipped some thing important. Now I'm lost, and starting not to care. Likewise, after being dumped out of the newbie levels, I have no idea where I am, why I chose to be there, or where I'm supposed to go next. Sure, sure, I've heard the name Bree before, but am I supposed to go there now or later? What's a 'scholar' and what's 'wood lore'? Oh, that can only be crafted by another player? Nice.
What WoW offered was a more distilled version of the online game. Doesn't require much thought but certainly can lead to spending lots of time enjoying it. LOTRO falls short of this, probably on purpose, but somewhat to it's detriment.
I've been playing my way through game content since 1974. Here's what the dungeon games all resolve down to:
for (iLevel = 1; iLevel iMaxLevelAllowed; iLevel++)
{
currentMonsters.hitPoints = X * iLevel;
currentMonsters.attackStrength = Y * iLevel;
currentMonsters.graphics = GetMonsterGraphics(iLevel);
currentTreasures.value = Z * iLevel;
}
And we players crank through the iLevel loop and get bored about the third or fourth time through. It's been this way since D&D was played only on paper with dice. Even with EQ2 and WoW it's still basically the same.
Why?
Two reasons. First, because there are far more players than content producers. And because computers are good at looping. So, the content producers, in a natural attempt to provide more play-time given a limited amount of content production resource use looping and repetition...this is why player's grind.
What does this have to do with LOTR MMO? Not much, except it's still going to, ultimately, be a boring grind.
To get past the boredom, we need an open RPG game where people are encouraged to produce content for other players. Maybe 2nd life fits that criteria. I dunno because 2nd Life doesn't have monsters and spells and wizards, so I've got no interest in it.
Luckily for you, then, "magic" or rather the lack thereof is lore appropriate in game. The only class that does anything that LOOKS like magic is the Lore-master. And actually, all of their skills have "scientific" explanations. IE he's not throwing a fireball, he's chucking some sort of burning chemical and embers on the enemy. The compromises made to the Tolkien lore in order to make a playable game are masterfully subtle, IMO. The traditional "nuker" role usually held by mages in other mmo's is transfered to Hunters in LotRO. They're the glass cannons of ME ;-}
You can grab an instrument and jam outside the Prancing Pony. Pretty avatars of other people stand around to listen, dance and make comments. Hard to resist that sometimes. Killer idea; allow players to rate performances. The game has me thinking.
Turbine has some good IP to work with. They've done it some credit. Work with the right NPC vendors enough and you'll learn scraps of Elvish. I've no doubt after sufficient play one will have a grasp of Middle Earth geography. It is certain that the effort placed on combat is matched elsewhere.
Tanks (guys with thick necks covered in metal) are functional. Champions own melee. Hunters don't. Hunters rely on a Legolas style repeating rifle called a Bow. Paper, scissors, rock.
Lag abounds occasionally. If I'm feeling it I know others are; plenty of hardware and bandwidth here. Not into WOW myself but by all evidence Blizzard has scalability figured out. I sense that LOTRO has some work to do there. If the game is a big hit they'll get it right.
The GUI needs some heavy lifting; it's confined by a lack of re-sizable windows. Perhaps customization will eventually permit it. The complaints that I have heard largely relate to issues stemming from the fact that in the beta you can't level over 30, so much of the game has yet to be experienced. The current beta caps your level at 15. Perhaps earlier test intervals allowed higher levels. I don't know. These games tend to change radically in higher level play, yet leveling here appears to be carefully progressive. I know the developers are working hard. I can feel it. Their still finishing some of the higher level content and deadlines have mounted.
Like other online fantasy games, it requires a commitment in time. If I find that I can walk away for a few weeks and still have fun when I get around to playing I'll be playing for years. If not well, there is always Warhammer.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old