Good post. I think everyone is freaking out because they wanted Vanguard to be more like EQ2 and WoW; accessible to everyone. EQ2 and WoW are great games and accessible to everyone but Vanguard is meant for a different category of Gamers.
I don't want to use the terms "hard core" or "casual" because calling WoW or EQ2 "casual" makes them sound like the Sims or something. They certainly are not and contain their own brand of Power Gamers as well. However, they allow for a range of playstyles from 30 minutes to 12 hour sessions.
Vanguard fills the void of the "Old School" MMORPG. To me Vanguard is really the successor to EQ1. It introduces some new concepts such as Diplomacy however, it retains the essence of the original EQ1. I can not imagine why the people who still play EQ1 would not consider moving to Vanguard.
Is it time consuming? Yes. Is it for the person who does not have a lot of time to spend gaming? No. However, the people who play the game want a time consuming, engaging, complicated, MMO. This will not appeal to everyone and will only appeal to a fraction of the overall MMORPG population. Maybe this is a bad thing only from a Sales or bottom line point of view but why should we care; we are Gamers not the Sony CFO. Why should we care if Vanguard has 1000 or 8,000,000 people playing it? As long as they keep the servers up we are good to go.
I am in the category of being a WoW and EQ2 player. Due to RL I simply can not play Vanguard. However, I want Vanguard to exist and not compromise itself and become more WoW-like. Vanguard can not "out WoW" WoW. They should not try because if they try WoW will eat it for lunch.
There is room for WoW, EQ2, Vanguard, WAR, LoTR, AoC and whatever else comes out for the genre. Rejoice in the variety and that these companies are giving us some great stuff to play for every playstyle.
I'd put graphics into ugly and diplomacy into bad, but this is just me.
Get a new computer my machine will play vanguard with every setting maxed at 1920x 1200 and on a dell 24inch wide screen the game is stunning blows anything ive ever seen out of the water
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Originally posted by thark Originally posted by swede2 Originally posted by altairzq I'd put graphics into ugly and diplomacy into bad, but this is just me.
Get a new computer my machine will play vanguard with every setting maxed at 1920x 1200 and on a dell 24inch wide screen the game is stunning blows anything ive ever seen out of the water
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old.. Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce.. Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid.. /Thark
Rubbish, the games graphics are stunning. Get a better system.
Now playing: VG (after a long break from MMORPGS) Played for more than a month: Darkfall online, Vanguard SOH, Everquest, Horizons, WoW, SWG, Everquest II, Eve
I am in the category of being a WoW and EQ2 player. Due to RL I simply can not play Vanguard. However, I want Vanguard to exist and not compromise itself and become more WoW-like. Vanguard can not "out WoW" WoW. They should not try because if they try WoW will eat it for lunch.
Actually, I am in the category of being a casual EQ2 player also, and am having a blast in Vanguard so far. Some things, like the mechanical interface, EQ2 does better, and some things, like diplomacy, Vanguard does better. Some things make you feel one game is just like the other (hopefully alot of fanbois choke on that one, but it's true).
Overall, each is it's own game, and has it's highs and lows. As a fellow casual gamer, I would suggest you check Vanguard out at some time or another. You may decide that it is not at all too "hard core" for you. It's at least worth a look.
To the people complaining about the graphics... its all about the game play folks, the graphics are a secondary concern....they are more than good enough..even if they are not the latest, state of the art.
To the folks concerned about how their gear "looks".... stop being so metro... its all about the stats anyways...and you'll likely keep that item for about...say....24 hours at this point.
As to performance complaints.... turn down the settings or buy a new machine.... either one works pretty well...
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I'd put graphics into ugly and diplomacy into bad, but this is just me.
Get a new computer my machine will play vanguard with every setting maxed at 1920x 1200 and on a dell 24inch wide screen the game is stunning blows anything ive ever seen out of the water
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Wow , why would you call me a lair Thark . Unreal i got the monitor a week before my new rig was finished and the differance in that alone totally blows me away if i figure out how to post screenshots all post some that will blow any mmo screenies out of the water
Yes this game was pushed out a little early, but over all I think it is great. I found towns and citys to be alive, the only thing I would change is the lack out animations in the characters. I don’t have a hi-end system and the game runs fine for me, I had to give up some of the looks for performance but I don’t mind.
System;
AMD 2100+
1GB RAM
ATI 9800 Pro 128
Yes this game doesn’t “hold your hand” it is hard, it’s a challenge. I think MMOers have become soft with other games. It seems I have been LVL 11 for ever, that’s my own fault for dieing. This game is group oriented but there is some solo continent. Grouping is what made EQ a great game.
There are still lag issues and for a game with no zones I hit a lot of walls where the game stops and stuff pops up in front of me. If your looking for a open game with loads of challenge give this game a try, if you need your hand held I know 8 Million others like you.
I'd put graphics into ugly and diplomacy into bad, but this is just me.
Get a new computer my machine will play vanguard with every setting maxed at 1920x 1200 and on a dell 24inch wide screen the game is stunning blows anything ive ever seen out of the water
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Wow , why would you call me a lair Thark . Unreal i got the monitor a week before my new rig was finished and the differance in that alone totally blows me away if i figure out how to post screenshots all post some that will blow any mmo screenies out of the water
Well, Not going to argue with you that the game "looks" better than mine on your huge widescreen monitor with the highest setting. Im certain it does, But that doesnt make Vanguard a game that has state of the art graphics, and/or even uses the lastest technology in grapics(not even close)
However in the MMORPG department Vanguard is decent graphically, but according to me it doesnt beat EQ2 its more close to AC2 in graphics or maybe Horizons..
Also, as I said there is no point in posting screenshots because they won't give you/me a fair wiev of the game, I can easy post 2 ugly screens for every nice screen in Vanguard..and these are on top notch settings.
Sure Its rather foolish of me to call you liar, but In this case and in many other places on this forum I see the same, people that are desparate in defence of Vanguard for some reason and make things up or gives biased reviews on a rather unfinished game.
Why can't you just accept the fact, Vanguard is what it is, neither you or me is going to change that, to tell people that Vanguard looks that good is just a poor lie..
I'd put graphics into ugly and diplomacy into bad, but this is just me.
Get a new computer my machine will play vanguard with every setting maxed at 1920x 1200 and on a dell 24inch wide screen the game is stunning blows anything ive ever seen out of the water
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Rubbish, the games graphics are stunning. Get a better system.
Well, I play the higheset setting with all the bells and wistles with 40 FPS(this was yesterday)...You are the one that talks "rubbish" fanboi.
I have played or tested almost every MMORPG on the market since UO.
Games played for an extended time:
Ulitma Online
Everquest
Asheron's Call
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Asheron's Call 2
Star Wars: Galaxies
City of Heroes / Villians
Everquest 2
Eve Online
World of Warcraft
I have been playing WoW since release, in fact, my character is still active. When I got into Vanguard's BETA in decided to help see what is was like and help test it for alittle while. I was impressed by the game but I knew it had a LONG way to go. Nearing the end of BETA 5 (their "open beta") Sigil started some major patching, almost everyday and sometime two times a day, and the gameplay got a lot better and a good many of the bugs were fixed. Out comes WoW - TBC and now I have to make a choice, WoW or Vanguard. I played the TBC for a week and found myself again being spoonfed through the areas. Within days several people in my guild had already made 70. With this in mind I decided to do the thee day head start and give Vanguard a real try.
GRAPHICS -- 9.0
First off, if you have a great system the graphics are excellent for a MMORPG. I am currently running with every setting maxed and get 60-75 FPS outdoors and 25-30 FPS indoors. There is some video lag when opening doors when the game goes to render the graphics behind the door. I am hoping this will be fix in the near future. If you have a good system (average for TODAY'S standards) the graphics are still better than average for any MMORPG, but alot of the bells and whistles that make the game really nice are usually turned off. I used pieces from my old computer and my friends old computer and tossed him together a better computerr (mid to high range in power) and he is running just above "balanced settings" with no trouble. The rig is an AMD FX2 4200+, 1.5 gigs of ram (older and mixed), ATI X700Pro 256mb, onboard sound. Everything but the soundcard is overclocked. If you have an old system that barely makes the minimum requirements you will probably want to skip this game until an upgrade of your computer. I tried playing Vanguard on my work computer P4 2.4 gig, 512mb ram, ATI 9800 and was crawling even with everything turned off. When Sigil said this was the MINIMUM system specs that would run their game, they were NOT kidding.
I enjoy seeing the grass and the tree sway in the breeze. Some of the other effects in the game as transparent ghosts are a really nice touch. The water looks great. The characters for the non-human races look good, not great, but good. The human races do look sort of plastic. The creature models are outstanding, especially the animals, bears, wolves, spiders, etc. I really like the look of the spiders! The character animations could use a little work. Nothing outstanding, but nothing too bad either. I wish they would make the jumping while running animation look a little better. The combat animations are pretty varied, not just the same two or three over and over. The spell animations have gotten alot better since BETA 5. I have a good idea we will see more animations added in the coming months. I usually play in first person PoV and this it is great to see my swords while I fight... or better, see the bolts shoot from my socerer's hand! Amazing! The armor is very detailed and so are some of the weapons.
THE WORLD -- 8.5
I have not gotten to see alot of it. How many of us have. In BETA I played around in almost everyone's starting area to check out the surroundings. The one thing that impressed me was the scale of the world itself. Not only is it HUGE, but is also gives you a feeling of size. My halfing bard really did feel 3 feet tall. With my dwarf warrior, I felt brutish, thick and hearty. This is because of the world is pretty close to actual scale. Trees in the game are very tall and with the other flora around, it gives you an idea of the size of your character in the world.
Travel appears to be time consuming but not too tedious. You get your mount at about level 10, which will speed your way out of the newbie areas. I think starter mounts are 12 silver. I actually enjoy a little bit of long travel as I am the explorer type and I like to look around. This has cost me EXP and a couple of corpse runs, but the destination is not important part, it is the journey that makes the trip worth while!
The cities are pretty well thought out. Especially, the dwarf city. It feels huge!! But this comes to my next problem with the game, it also feels pretty empty. Sigil needs to put more NPC's walking around in the cities doing things people would do in their daily lives. The High Elf city is crawling with NPC's. Almost every room you go into there is some NPC there! The dwarf city and some of the other cities don't feel complete. Also I wish they would also give the characters a little life other than just standing there. At least in WoW the mobs would walk around and talk to each other. This needs to be put in to further the realistic feel of the game. I would also like to see other small things that would be of help, birds flying around, fish in the oceans and lakes and insects running around on the ground.
On a personal note... I WANT TO FLY AROUND ON A MOUNT!!!
SOUND -- 7.5
The sounds in the game are average for an MMORPG. The majority of the sounds are excellent and make you feel you are right there in the world (especially using a good set of head phones). The growls and pains of the animals are great. The environmental sounds, like water running in a river and background sounds are amazing. Those sounds are in the background enough where they are not annoying and if you are not paying attention to them, you sort of shut them out until you are ready to enjoy them. Now for the bad... my biggest problem with the environmental sounds is with the running water.. the sound itself is GREAT.. how it suddenly kicks in SUCKS! There is this magical line you cross, on one side you can hear the water, move an inch and you can't hear it. BADDDDDDDDD! It should fade in.
The combat sounds are also good. There are plenty noises of pain as you are getting your butt kicked or doing some butt kicking. If you are fighting several mobs at once though, the grunts and groans begin to sound like a bad p0rn movie! Oh baby, oh baby, oh baby.... It is not horrible, they just need to space them out some more. The casting sounds are about average. I was hoping for some neat sound effects on things like energy bolts or the druid lightning spells, but you just sort of get a noise. A couple sound changes would have made the overall feel of the game great.
CLASSES -- 9.5
Most of the classes are not anything new. So why did I give Vanguard and their character's such a high rating? This is because they did a great job with the class roles, did some interesting twists on common classes and came up with new classes. They did not do anything really new, but took stuff from previous MMORPG's and built on it.
With Vanguard being a grouping game, Sigil did what they should have done, they defined everyone's class role from the start. They are even divided up for you on the character creation screen. From there, you decide what you want your role to be... melee defensive, melee offensive, healer, caster offensive... easy as pie. Sigil claims that each class in its arch type can do it as good as the others in same category. This means no real best tank, healer, damage dealer, etc. So now you get to decide how you want to play based on your individual playstyle. Each class has his/her own separate way of getting the job done. Each class has its weakness and its strengths. How do you want to do your job? That is the question! This started to be the problem with WoW near the end of the game. Blizzard spend so much time blurring the class roles, people were getting upset. Rogue and mages were being out damaged by warlocks, even though they were supposed to be the best damage dealers. Priests were being out healed by paladins. Druids are out tanking warriors. Warriors were out DPSing rogues. The list goes on. I like the fact that Sigil put us all in our little niche and said here is your role.. DO IT!
As for the common classes, I like what they did. They gave a new life to them. I think it is great that paladins are the tanks and fighters that they were supposed to be. Not some pansy hybrid that can't do either his jobs worth a damn. Instead, Sigil gave paladins their typical skills, but made them part of their secondary skill set and adjusted them accordingly. A paladin simply will not be able to heal a group. He is a tank that has heals as a benefical backup, not a main skill. It is similar to the druids. Druids are not healers, but an offensive caster. Do they have heals, yes, but are they ever going to heal a group, nope... can they help out in a pinch, of course, which is what secondary skills are all about. They are extra, a little help. The ability of bards to make their own songs was an excellent idea. I did not play a bard to any good level, but I hope they still have that ability.
There are a couple of new classes. The main one being the blood mage. The blood mage is an interesting new way to play a healer in MMORPG's. He is sort of an offensive healer with some interesting spells. The other two "new" classes the psionist and dreadknight remind me of the enchanter and the shadow knight, respectively, from EQ. This is merely on the surface because the classes are very different than their EQ counterparts.
Finally, you can actually get to see what a character is like in the future by playing it up to 10-14ish. So you can actually dabble in more than one class to find your playstyle until you can decide on a final class. This is great.. there is nothing worse than to find out your "X" badass character suxs 10 days played into the game. Of course, we still may find out that "X" class sucks post 30, but at least you will have a feel of what your classes defining abilities will be.
Nothing amazing here, just more of a shake up in the type class setup. Thumbs way up!
GAMEPLAY -- 8.0
The gameplay so far has not been anything you don't expect from any MMORPG. Alot of quest and killing of mobs. I mean what else were you expecting!! The game plays very smooth and is easy to get to know. You don't start corpse runs until level 7, which gives you plenty of time to get the feel for your class before you start having to make that dreaded trip. The newbie quest are about average, pretty simple over all, but you are not spoon fed locations for the most part, more of a general direction. Sigil did a good job easing new players into the non-aggro to aggro mobs transition. Right off the bat you will get non-aggro mobs with a few aggro mobs here and there to liven things up. Later, most mobs go hostile and will assist, run, and be linked.
The introduction to crafting is great. It gives you enough information to get your started (plus most of your n00b tools for free!) without all the boring reading lines and lines of text to understand what the hell you are doing. It also leaves alot of learning up to you as you progress deeper into crafting.
Diplomacy introduction is good, it could use a little polish. The early diplomacy quest are fun and are a good breather from killing goblins all day. Plus, you never know what you can find out. A lot of the lore seems to be given out in the diplomacy sphere so if you are a lore nut, you better get ready.
I have not been to any dungeon other than the Arcanium in the High Elf area. It was an interesting time. I managed to find a group pretty easy, though it was not balanced, and we did well... HORRIBLE to start with. We had more than a couple corpse runs, even with the party being made up of alot of healers. (Two sorc, 1 cleric, 2 blood mages) After a while the group sort of clicked and we started killing spiders left and right! My overall first dungeon experience was a good one.
Oh, speaking of the dungeon... life, stamina and energy all come back at a very good rate. Especially life and stamina. Don't worry about alot of down time because there is not a lot. Also for the casters, there is the /rest command that will help you get your mana back fast. I can only be used out of combat. I hope the dungeons in the future are similar to the Arcanium as it seemed not to be to camper friendly, as the spawns were fast and they aggro immediately upon spawn. You had to keep moving to stay alive. I think this is a huge plus.
Now for the bad part of the game play.... THE BUGS! There are more than a few. However, a will say this, the number of bugs in the game has dropped a TON since the last few days of BETA, into the 3 day headstart, into release. They are patching a huge number of bugs daily. I am really impressed with the way Sigil is fixing all the bugs.... with that said, THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN FIXED IN BETA!!!!!!! Okay, down from my soapbox now. I have fallen through the world once. I have had dozens of mobs disappear on me while I was fighting them. You see them and poof they are gone. I usually think they have run, so I look for them, the whole while they are standing in front of me beating the hell out of me! It is annoying and needs to be fixed. Also some of the animals appear to be attacking out of the ground. You see the head and front legs but the hindend is buried in the ground. During the three day headstart (not part of BETA) a quest giver in the High Elf area was quacking players for completing a quest he gave them. And your reward for this quest is 1 silver and a corpse run... GRATS!
I have read in several BETA journals that the game does not really become interesting until 25+. The testers claim that it appeared that Sigil knew that the low levels would be zoomed through in short time, so they developed and fleshed out more of the 30+ content than they did the pre-20's content. I hope they are right, because the game would be that much more fun.
SUMMARY:
Overall, I think Vanguard has potential to be one of the best MMORPG's on the market. However, they have SoE on their coattails so anything could happen. I think the game is very solid at its core, but it could use some touching up.. just a tad bit of polish. It is a nice change from the spoon fed WoW and the OMG, I have to play how long EQ. I agree with other posters that said this is truly EQ2. I will stick with the game for the coming months. Sigil has some stiff competion already with WoW and more on its way with Age of Conan (which is beatiful!) and Warhammer Online. It is going to take constant development to start moving people from WoW when they get bored into Vanguard. The only way this is going to happen is if Vanguard keeps its players happy and keep their reviews up.
I'd put graphics into ugly and diplomacy into bad, but this is just me.
Get a new computer my machine will play vanguard with every setting maxed at 1920x 1200 and on a dell 24inch wide screen the game is stunning blows anything ive ever seen out of the water
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Wow , why would you call me a lair Thark . Unreal i got the monitor a week before my new rig was finished and the differance in that alone totally blows me away if i figure out how to post screenshots all post some that will blow any mmo screenies out of the water
Well, Not going to argue with you that the game "looks" better than mine on your huge widescreen monitor with the highest setting. Im certain it does, But that doesnt make Vanguard a game that has state of the art graphics, and/or even uses the lastest technology in grapics(not even close)
However in the MMORPG department Vanguard is decent graphically, but according to me it doesnt beat EQ2 its more close to AC2 in graphics or maybe Horizons..
Also, as I said there is no point in posting screenshots because they won't give you/me a fair wiev of the game, I can easy post 2 ugly screens for every nice screen in Vanguard..and these are on top notch settings.
Sure Its rather foolish of me to call you liar, but In this case and in many other places on this forum I see the same, people that are desparate in defence of Vanguard for some reason and make things up or gives biased reviews on a rather unfinished game.
Why can't you just accept the fact, Vanguard is what it is, neither you or me is going to change that, to tell people that Vanguard looks that good is just a poor lie..
/thark
Sorry but your the one that sounds desperate, Now i havent played any of the games you listed so am not going to call you a liar like you did to me but to state that vanguard's graphics are not good total BS and you know it
ive played alot of games in the last 5 years and well i didnt care for the games themself i cant think of any that didnt have pretty good graphics like WOW totally not my style of graphics but i could still appreciate them for what are. Blizzard did a good job, but for me to say there bad because i dont like them is what i would call desperate
Oh and about posting screenshot all tell you ive been to alot of places on good old mother earth and some are so beautiful that they take your breath away and some places i never want to go again, a good mmo should be diverse just like a real world
Comments
Good post. I think everyone is freaking out because they wanted Vanguard to be more like EQ2 and WoW; accessible to everyone. EQ2 and WoW are great games and accessible to everyone but Vanguard is meant for a different category of Gamers.
I don't want to use the terms "hard core" or "casual" because calling WoW or EQ2 "casual" makes them sound like the Sims or something. They certainly are not and contain their own brand of Power Gamers as well. However, they allow for a range of playstyles from 30 minutes to 12 hour sessions.
Vanguard fills the void of the "Old School" MMORPG. To me Vanguard is really the successor to EQ1. It introduces some new concepts such as Diplomacy however, it retains the essence of the original EQ1. I can not imagine why the people who still play EQ1 would not consider moving to Vanguard.
Is it time consuming? Yes. Is it for the person who does not have a lot of time to spend gaming? No. However, the people who play the game want a time consuming, engaging, complicated, MMO. This will not appeal to everyone and will only appeal to a fraction of the overall MMORPG population. Maybe this is a bad thing only from a Sales or bottom line point of view but why should we care; we are Gamers not the Sony CFO. Why should we care if Vanguard has 1000 or 8,000,000 people playing it? As long as they keep the servers up we are good to go.
I am in the category of being a WoW and EQ2 player. Due to RL I simply can not play Vanguard. However, I want Vanguard to exist and not compromise itself and become more WoW-like. Vanguard can not "out WoW" WoW. They should not try because if they try WoW will eat it for lunch.
There is room for WoW, EQ2, Vanguard, WAR, LoTR, AoC and whatever else comes out for the genre. Rejoice in the variety and that these companies are giving us some great stuff to play for every playstyle.
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Rubbish, the games graphics are stunning. Get a better system.
Now playing: VG (after a long break from MMORPGS)
Played for more than a month: Darkfall online, Vanguard SOH, Everquest, Horizons, WoW, SWG, Everquest II, Eve
Actually, I am in the category of being a casual EQ2 player also, and am having a blast in Vanguard so far. Some things, like the mechanical interface, EQ2 does better, and some things, like diplomacy, Vanguard does better. Some things make you feel one game is just like the other (hopefully alot of fanbois choke on that one, but it's true).
Overall, each is it's own game, and has it's highs and lows. As a fellow casual gamer, I would suggest you check Vanguard out at some time or another. You may decide that it is not at all too "hard core" for you. It's at least worth a look.
To the OP...good post....
To the people complaining about the graphics... its all about the game play folks, the graphics are a secondary concern....they are more than good enough..even if they are not the latest, state of the art.
To the folks concerned about how their gear "looks".... stop being so metro... its all about the stats anyways...and you'll likely keep that item for about...say....24 hours at this point.
As to performance complaints.... turn down the settings or buy a new machine.... either one works pretty well...
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Wow , why would you call me a lair Thark . Unreal i got the monitor a week before my new rig was finished and the differance in that alone totally blows me away if i figure out how to post screenshots all post some that will blow any mmo screenies out of the water
Yes this game was pushed out a little early, but over all I think it is great. I found towns and citys to be alive, the only thing I would change is the lack out animations in the characters. I don’t have a hi-end system and the game runs fine for me, I had to give up some of the looks for performance but I don’t mind.
System;
AMD 2100+
1GB RAM
ATI 9800 Pro 128
Yes this game doesn’t “hold your hand” it is hard, it’s a challenge. I think MMOers have become soft with other games. It seems I have been LVL 11 for ever, that’s my own fault for dieing. This game is group oriented but there is some solo continent. Grouping is what made EQ a great game.
There are still lag issues and for a game with no zones I hit a lot of walls where the game stops and stuff pops up in front of me. If your looking for a open game with loads of challenge give this game a try, if you need your hand held I know 8 Million others like you.
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Wow , why would you call me a lair Thark . Unreal i got the monitor a week before my new rig was finished and the differance in that alone totally blows me away if i figure out how to post screenshots all post some that will blow any mmo screenies out of the water
Well, Not going to argue with you that the game "looks" better than mine on your huge widescreen monitor with the highest setting. Im certain it does, But that doesnt make Vanguard a game that has state of the art graphics, and/or even uses the lastest technology in grapics(not even close)
However in the MMORPG department Vanguard is decent graphically, but according to me it doesnt beat EQ2 its more close to AC2 in graphics or maybe Horizons..
Also, as I said there is no point in posting screenshots because they won't give you/me a fair wiev of the game, I can easy post 2 ugly screens for every nice screen in Vanguard..and these are on top notch settings.
Sure Its rather foolish of me to call you liar, but In this case and in many other places on this forum I see the same, people that are desparate in defence of Vanguard for some reason and make things up or gives biased reviews on a rather unfinished game.
Why can't you just accept the fact, Vanguard is what it is, neither you or me is going to change that, to tell people that Vanguard looks that good is just a poor lie..
/thark
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Rubbish, the games graphics are stunning. Get a better system.
Well, I play the higheset setting with all the bells and wistles with 40 FPS(this was yesterday)...You are the one that talks "rubbish" fanboi.
/Thark
Current machine:
AMD X2 5200+ overclocked
2gigs Corsair Dominator Ram overclocked
GeForce 8800 GTX
Soundblaster Audigy 2
Background:
I have played or tested almost every MMORPG on the market since UO.
Games played for an extended time:
Ulitma Online
Everquest
Asheron's Call
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Asheron's Call 2
Star Wars: Galaxies
City of Heroes / Villians
Everquest 2
Eve Online
World of Warcraft
I have been playing WoW since release, in fact, my character is still active. When I got into Vanguard's BETA in decided to help see what is was like and help test it for alittle while. I was impressed by the game but I knew it had a LONG way to go. Nearing the end of BETA 5 (their "open beta") Sigil started some major patching, almost everyday and sometime two times a day, and the gameplay got a lot better and a good many of the bugs were fixed. Out comes WoW - TBC and now I have to make a choice, WoW or Vanguard. I played the TBC for a week and found myself again being spoonfed through the areas. Within days several people in my guild had already made 70. With this in mind I decided to do the thee day head start and give Vanguard a real try.
GRAPHICS -- 9.0
First off, if you have a great system the graphics are excellent for a MMORPG. I am currently running with every setting maxed and get 60-75 FPS outdoors and 25-30 FPS indoors. There is some video lag when opening doors when the game goes to render the graphics behind the door. I am hoping this will be fix in the near future. If you have a good system (average for TODAY'S standards) the graphics are still better than average for any MMORPG, but alot of the bells and whistles that make the game really nice are usually turned off. I used pieces from my old computer and my friends old computer and tossed him together a better computerr (mid to high range in power) and he is running just above "balanced settings" with no trouble. The rig is an AMD FX2 4200+, 1.5 gigs of ram (older and mixed), ATI X700Pro 256mb, onboard sound. Everything but the soundcard is overclocked. If you have an old system that barely makes the minimum requirements you will probably want to skip this game until an upgrade of your computer. I tried playing Vanguard on my work computer P4 2.4 gig, 512mb ram, ATI 9800 and was crawling even with everything turned off. When Sigil said this was the MINIMUM system specs that would run their game, they were NOT kidding.
I enjoy seeing the grass and the tree sway in the breeze. Some of the other effects in the game as transparent ghosts are a really nice touch. The water looks great. The characters for the non-human races look good, not great, but good. The human races do look sort of plastic. The creature models are outstanding, especially the animals, bears, wolves, spiders, etc. I really like the look of the spiders! The character animations could use a little work. Nothing outstanding, but nothing too bad either. I wish they would make the jumping while running animation look a little better. The combat animations are pretty varied, not just the same two or three over and over. The spell animations have gotten alot better since BETA 5. I have a good idea we will see more animations added in the coming months. I usually play in first person PoV and this it is great to see my swords while I fight... or better, see the bolts shoot from my socerer's hand! Amazing! The armor is very detailed and so are some of the weapons.
THE WORLD -- 8.5
I have not gotten to see alot of it. How many of us have. In BETA I played around in almost everyone's starting area to check out the surroundings. The one thing that impressed me was the scale of the world itself. Not only is it HUGE, but is also gives you a feeling of size. My halfing bard really did feel 3 feet tall. With my dwarf warrior, I felt brutish, thick and hearty. This is because of the world is pretty close to actual scale. Trees in the game are very tall and with the other flora around, it gives you an idea of the size of your character in the world.
Travel appears to be time consuming but not too tedious. You get your mount at about level 10, which will speed your way out of the newbie areas. I think starter mounts are 12 silver. I actually enjoy a little bit of long travel as I am the explorer type and I like to look around. This has cost me EXP and a couple of corpse runs, but the destination is not important part, it is the journey that makes the trip worth while!
The cities are pretty well thought out. Especially, the dwarf city. It feels huge!! But this comes to my next problem with the game, it also feels pretty empty. Sigil needs to put more NPC's walking around in the cities doing things people would do in their daily lives. The High Elf city is crawling with NPC's. Almost every room you go into there is some NPC there! The dwarf city and some of the other cities don't feel complete. Also I wish they would also give the characters a little life other than just standing there. At least in WoW the mobs would walk around and talk to each other. This needs to be put in to further the realistic feel of the game. I would also like to see other small things that would be of help, birds flying around, fish in the oceans and lakes and insects running around on the ground.
On a personal note... I WANT TO FLY AROUND ON A MOUNT!!!
SOUND -- 7.5
The sounds in the game are average for an MMORPG. The majority of the sounds are excellent and make you feel you are right there in the world (especially using a good set of head phones). The growls and pains of the animals are great. The environmental sounds, like water running in a river and background sounds are amazing. Those sounds are in the background enough where they are not annoying and if you are not paying attention to them, you sort of shut them out until you are ready to enjoy them. Now for the bad... my biggest problem with the environmental sounds is with the running water.. the sound itself is GREAT.. how it suddenly kicks in SUCKS! There is this magical line you cross, on one side you can hear the water, move an inch and you can't hear it. BADDDDDDDDD! It should fade in.
The combat sounds are also good. There are plenty noises of pain as you are getting your butt kicked or doing some butt kicking. If you are fighting several mobs at once though, the grunts and groans begin to sound like a bad p0rn movie! Oh baby, oh baby, oh baby.... It is not horrible, they just need to space them out some more. The casting sounds are about average. I was hoping for some neat sound effects on things like energy bolts or the druid lightning spells, but you just sort of get a noise. A couple sound changes would have made the overall feel of the game great.
CLASSES -- 9.5
Most of the classes are not anything new. So why did I give Vanguard and their character's such a high rating? This is because they did a great job with the class roles, did some interesting twists on common classes and came up with new classes. They did not do anything really new, but took stuff from previous MMORPG's and built on it.
With Vanguard being a grouping game, Sigil did what they should have done, they defined everyone's class role from the start. They are even divided up for you on the character creation screen. From there, you decide what you want your role to be... melee defensive, melee offensive, healer, caster offensive... easy as pie. Sigil claims that each class in its arch type can do it as good as the others in same category. This means no real best tank, healer, damage dealer, etc. So now you get to decide how you want to play based on your individual playstyle. Each class has his/her own separate way of getting the job done. Each class has its weakness and its strengths. How do you want to do your job? That is the question! This started to be the problem with WoW near the end of the game. Blizzard spend so much time blurring the class roles, people were getting upset. Rogue and mages were being out damaged by warlocks, even though they were supposed to be the best damage dealers. Priests were being out healed by paladins. Druids are out tanking warriors. Warriors were out DPSing rogues. The list goes on. I like the fact that Sigil put us all in our little niche and said here is your role.. DO IT!
As for the common classes, I like what they did. They gave a new life to them. I think it is great that paladins are the tanks and fighters that they were supposed to be. Not some pansy hybrid that can't do either his jobs worth a damn. Instead, Sigil gave paladins their typical skills, but made them part of their secondary skill set and adjusted them accordingly. A paladin simply will not be able to heal a group. He is a tank that has heals as a benefical backup, not a main skill. It is similar to the druids. Druids are not healers, but an offensive caster. Do they have heals, yes, but are they ever going to heal a group, nope... can they help out in a pinch, of course, which is what secondary skills are all about. They are extra, a little help. The ability of bards to make their own songs was an excellent idea. I did not play a bard to any good level, but I hope they still have that ability.
There are a couple of new classes. The main one being the blood mage. The blood mage is an interesting new way to play a healer in MMORPG's. He is sort of an offensive healer with some interesting spells. The other two "new" classes the psionist and dreadknight remind me of the enchanter and the shadow knight, respectively, from EQ. This is merely on the surface because the classes are very different than their EQ counterparts.
Finally, you can actually get to see what a character is like in the future by playing it up to 10-14ish. So you can actually dabble in more than one class to find your playstyle until you can decide on a final class. This is great.. there is nothing worse than to find out your "X" badass character suxs 10 days played into the game. Of course, we still may find out that "X" class sucks post 30, but at least you will have a feel of what your classes defining abilities will be.
Nothing amazing here, just more of a shake up in the type class setup. Thumbs way up!
GAMEPLAY -- 8.0
The gameplay so far has not been anything you don't expect from any MMORPG. Alot of quest and killing of mobs. I mean what else were you expecting!! The game plays very smooth and is easy to get to know. You don't start corpse runs until level 7, which gives you plenty of time to get the feel for your class before you start having to make that dreaded trip. The newbie quest are about average, pretty simple over all, but you are not spoon fed locations for the most part, more of a general direction. Sigil did a good job easing new players into the non-aggro to aggro mobs transition. Right off the bat you will get non-aggro mobs with a few aggro mobs here and there to liven things up. Later, most mobs go hostile and will assist, run, and be linked.
The introduction to crafting is great. It gives you enough information to get your started (plus most of your n00b tools for free!) without all the boring reading lines and lines of text to understand what the hell you are doing. It also leaves alot of learning up to you as you progress deeper into crafting.
Diplomacy introduction is good, it could use a little polish. The early diplomacy quest are fun and are a good breather from killing goblins all day. Plus, you never know what you can find out. A lot of the lore seems to be given out in the diplomacy sphere so if you are a lore nut, you better get ready.
I have not been to any dungeon other than the Arcanium in the High Elf area. It was an interesting time. I managed to find a group pretty easy, though it was not balanced, and we did well... HORRIBLE to start with. We had more than a couple corpse runs, even with the party being made up of alot of healers. (Two sorc, 1 cleric, 2 blood mages) After a while the group sort of clicked and we started killing spiders left and right! My overall first dungeon experience was a good one.
Oh, speaking of the dungeon... life, stamina and energy all come back at a very good rate. Especially life and stamina. Don't worry about alot of down time because there is not a lot. Also for the casters, there is the /rest command that will help you get your mana back fast. I can only be used out of combat. I hope the dungeons in the future are similar to the Arcanium as it seemed not to be to camper friendly, as the spawns were fast and they aggro immediately upon spawn. You had to keep moving to stay alive. I think this is a huge plus.
Now for the bad part of the game play.... THE BUGS! There are more than a few. However, a will say this, the number of bugs in the game has dropped a TON since the last few days of BETA, into the 3 day headstart, into release. They are patching a huge number of bugs daily. I am really impressed with the way Sigil is fixing all the bugs.... with that said, THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN FIXED IN BETA!!!!!!! Okay, down from my soapbox now. I have fallen through the world once. I have had dozens of mobs disappear on me while I was fighting them. You see them and poof they are gone. I usually think they have run, so I look for them, the whole while they are standing in front of me beating the hell out of me! It is annoying and needs to be fixed. Also some of the animals appear to be attacking out of the ground. You see the head and front legs but the hindend is buried in the ground. During the three day headstart (not part of BETA) a quest giver in the High Elf area was quacking players for completing a quest he gave them. And your reward for this quest is 1 silver and a corpse run... GRATS!
I have read in several BETA journals that the game does not really become interesting until 25+. The testers claim that it appeared that Sigil knew that the low levels would be zoomed through in short time, so they developed and fleshed out more of the 30+ content than they did the pre-20's content. I hope they are right, because the game would be that much more fun.
SUMMARY:
Overall, I think Vanguard has potential to be one of the best MMORPG's on the market. However, they have SoE on their coattails so anything could happen. I think the game is very solid at its core, but it could use some touching up.. just a tad bit of polish. It is a nice change from the spoon fed WoW and the OMG, I have to play how long EQ. I agree with other posters that said this is truly EQ2. I will stick with the game for the coming months. Sigil has some stiff competion already with WoW and more on its way with Age of Conan (which is beatiful!) and Warhammer Online. It is going to take constant development to start moving people from WoW when they get bored into Vanguard. The only way this is going to happen is if Vanguard keeps its players happy and keep their reviews up.
I hope someone actually reads this!!!
Syphon
Blood Mage of Flamehammer
Then you cant have tested or seen many games im afraid....Or you are simply a liar or to proud to admit that the game you have been waiting for for so long is in this bad shape as it is..Yes yes there is some nice sites in the game I admit that, but the overall picture doesnt cut it all, look at the water for instance, makes you wonder if you play a game that is 3-4 years old..
Its the whole picture that makes the impressions, not just a couple of still pictures at various good looking places..Im totally convinced if you post a good looking picture I can post you 2 Ugly ones in responce..
Overall the ugly will win I'm afraid..
/Thark
Wow , why would you call me a lair Thark . Unreal i got the monitor a week before my new rig was finished and the differance in that alone totally blows me away if i figure out how to post screenshots all post some that will blow any mmo screenies out of the water
Well, Not going to argue with you that the game "looks" better than mine on your huge widescreen monitor with the highest setting. Im certain it does, But that doesnt make Vanguard a game that has state of the art graphics, and/or even uses the lastest technology in grapics(not even close)
However in the MMORPG department Vanguard is decent graphically, but according to me it doesnt beat EQ2 its more close to AC2 in graphics or maybe Horizons..
Also, as I said there is no point in posting screenshots because they won't give you/me a fair wiev of the game, I can easy post 2 ugly screens for every nice screen in Vanguard..and these are on top notch settings.
Sure Its rather foolish of me to call you liar, but In this case and in many other places on this forum I see the same, people that are desparate in defence of Vanguard for some reason and make things up or gives biased reviews on a rather unfinished game.
Why can't you just accept the fact, Vanguard is what it is, neither you or me is going to change that, to tell people that Vanguard looks that good is just a poor lie..
/thark
Sorry but your the one that sounds desperate, Now i havent played any of the games you listed so am not going to call you a liar like you did to me but to state that vanguard's graphics are not good total BS and you know it
ive played alot of games in the last 5 years and well i didnt care for the games themself i cant think of any that didnt have pretty good graphics like WOW totally not my style of graphics but i could still appreciate them for what are. Blizzard did a good job, but for me to say there bad because i dont like them is what i would call desperate
Oh and about posting screenshot all tell you ive been to alot of places on good old mother earth and some are so beautiful that they take your breath away and some places i never want to go again, a good mmo should be diverse just like a real world