Wel, after trying out the open bet, the game does look a little better ingame, than it does in the screen shots on the web site. The graphics are improved dlightly over DDO, but, the character faces are still pretty lousy and the hair is still terrible. Character customization is very limited. For the dwarves, the only thing changin the head type does is change the nose. They should have named it Nose type.
After playing for a while it's pretty aparent that this game is pretty much a WOW clone, without allt he stuff that makes WOW fun. Again, like DDO you are locked in astarting area, and can't go out and explore the world, like you can in WOW. The characters and stories are dull, and the quests are boring and repetitive. Overall, if you've played WOW, this game has nothing new to offer and you will get bored very quickly. If you liked DDO, you will probably like this game. I'm just glad I didn't have to pay anything to play this game. Overall, this game is a slight imporvement over other Turbine games, but not by much (And mainly because they ripped off a lof of character actions and such from WOW).
Wel, after trying out the open bet, the game does look a little better ingame, than it does in the screen shots on the web site. The graphics are improved dlightly over DDO, but, the character faces are still pretty lousy and the hair is still terrible. Character customization is very limited. For the dwarves, the only thing changin the head type does is change the nose. They should have named it Nose type.
After playing for a while it's pretty aparent that this game is pretty much a WOW clone, without allt he stuff that makes WOW fun. Again, like DDO you are locked in astarting area, and can't go out and explore the world, like you can in WOW. The characters and stories are dull, and the quests are boring and repetitive. Overall, if you've played WOW, this game has nothing new to offer and you will get bored very quickly. If you liked DDO, you will probably like this game. I'm just glad I didn't have to pay anything to play this game. Overall, this game is a slight imporvement over other Turbine games, but not by much (And mainly because they ripped off a lof of character actions and such from WOW).
from my experience ingame in comparison to the time i was playing WoW the only similarities lie in the engine mechanics for crafting and the chat window and the toolbar part is similar. you seem to be the kind of person who likes overly cartoony looking characters in fantasy games, and that's ok but please do not rag on a game that you think sucks cuz your character cant have a neon pink mohawk or something shitty like that. this game's characters are supposed to look like they would if they existed in RL not if you got blizzard to parody them. fact of the matter is, you might not like it because either A: you only played for under 1 hour and were prepared to dislike it from the start or, you have some sort of distaste for LOTR in some way, or you were expecting way way way way too much from it.
I find it to be fun just for the reasons of : A: it's got nice graphics that make the locations portrayed in them look nice.
B:the fact that it is LOTR and thus i like to be able to explore the map first hand.
C: I roleplay alot, random quests for people are ALWAYS boring and repetetive in MMOs the storyline quests are where it gets fun. (the epic series of quests)
Easy to learn the basics, but even there there is depth and things to enjoy and explore.
E: not 40,000 griefers nuking quest entities with fireballs everywhere... hell I've seen maby 5 people who are loremasters(LOTRO's magic users) in 3 days, in MMOs that's an insane record low for mages.
F: they let you choose your origin and give you all the traditional naming rules for that origin so you can make your own name yet have it look authentic for easy roleplay.
G: Surname and family tree, first game I've seen to have a family tree thingy in it, seriously this game is hard core in the roleplay aspect, alotta tools available for RPing.
H: for those who think it ends there. monster play, not tried it yet but seen alot of things about it. you can play as the bad guys, making it not at all bland.
I: aparently in monster play the monster players can't craft, but they get destiny points to spend on special stuff to make em stronger instead, this adds diversity to the game in that the realism of the lore is there, after all howmany extremely creative orcs that make wonderful swords(not those ugly blunt ass scimitars they make in the movies, those are not well made at all) in any LOTR material(books/movies).
J: you can't survive enemies agroing you just by "running" an area like you can in WoW where just about nothing can run faster than a player. I've been charged down by an angry predator hit with a speed debuff and eaten alive in areas where i was way way too weak to be in (IE misty mountainst at level 10 as an elf hunter) all i can say is, PAIN!!!!!!!!!!!! also they made a fairly good run at avoiding the whole "cloning/ressurecting" difficulty since there are no instances of any of those things in the literature or the movies by replacing HP with morale, you just Retreat back to a safe spot(run like a schoolgirl) it counts as a defeat gives you a dread type debuff lowering your maximum morale for awhile(after all how happy you gonna feel after getting your ass handed to ya) also you get dread just for being near really dangerouse creature(cuz how are you going to feel when you're staring down a Nazgul or a troll, not too good i'm betting)
making you easier to kill... meaning that you gotta be careful and grouping to fell mighty foes is a wise Idea, rather than all these stupid fantasy games where a big guy can go around nuking hellishly powerful stuff all by his lonesome.
I know it's a long post but I could make it longer as there are at least 10 more things i could add to that list, i think however that I don't need to.
LOTRO forums are full of porno ads? Where? I never saw any.
I guess from now on every MMO will be a WoW clone according to some people.
I played WoW from US release (Nov 04) until a few weeks ago. I have also played LOTRO since
Beta 1 (Sept 06). I know a few things about both games.
The funny thing is that most of the beta testers wanted things added that resemble WoW.
Node tracking is the biggest similarity to WoW.
If this is a WoW clone like everyone said, then the Clone sure has more features than the original.
If WoW would add unlockable titles through deeds, crafting tiers, areas that change after you did
a quest (not like AQ gates), and conjunctions, then it would be a better game.
I think it's time for me to start reading the WAR is a WoW clone threads again. Some people think
Blizzard invented MMOs.
too true, way way too true.
WoW was the first MMO that allot of people played due to allot of the people who played wow as a first mmo heard about it from a friend or someone who plays it. just due to it's inherent popularity because of blizzard already having a huge following from their previous releases. it tends to taint the majority's viewpoint allot.
I personally find that it's not as fun as the strategy games that spawned it... but that's just my opinion.
simply put Blizzard is the company that has effectively ripped off every other created genre in existence... they were even sued by Games Workshop due to the unbridled similarities between their marines and space marines... funny thing I think is the lack of a LOTR MMO earlier as Lord of the rings lore has been the major inspiration to almost all modern "Fantasy" type stuff. almost amazed that the actual lord of the rings title wasn't used before... if it was, people would be calling WoW a LOTR clone instead
Comments
Wel, after trying out the open bet, the game does look a little better ingame, than it does in the screen shots on the web site. The graphics are improved dlightly over DDO, but, the character faces are still pretty lousy and the hair is still terrible. Character customization is very limited. For the dwarves, the only thing changin the head type does is change the nose. They should have named it Nose type.
After playing for a while it's pretty aparent that this game is pretty much a WOW clone, without allt he stuff that makes WOW fun. Again, like DDO you are locked in astarting area, and can't go out and explore the world, like you can in WOW. The characters and stories are dull, and the quests are boring and repetitive. Overall, if you've played WOW, this game has nothing new to offer and you will get bored very quickly. If you liked DDO, you will probably like this game. I'm just glad I didn't have to pay anything to play this game. Overall, this game is a slight imporvement over other Turbine games, but not by much (And mainly because they ripped off a lof of character actions and such from WOW).
I find it to be fun just for the reasons of : A: it's got nice graphics that make the locations portrayed in them look nice.
B:the fact that it is LOTR and thus i like to be able to explore the map first hand.
C: I roleplay alot, random quests for people are ALWAYS boring and repetetive in MMOs the storyline quests are where it gets fun. (the epic series of quests)
E: not 40,000 griefers nuking quest entities with fireballs everywhere... hell I've seen maby 5 people who are loremasters(LOTRO's magic users) in 3 days, in MMOs that's an insane record low for mages.
F: they let you choose your origin and give you all the traditional naming rules for that origin so you can make your own name yet have it look authentic for easy roleplay.
G: Surname and family tree, first game I've seen to have a family tree thingy in it, seriously this game is hard core in the roleplay aspect, alotta tools available for RPing.
H: for those who think it ends there. monster play, not tried it yet but seen alot of things about it. you can play as the bad guys, making it not at all bland.
I: aparently in monster play the monster players can't craft, but they get destiny points to spend on special stuff to make em stronger instead, this adds diversity to the game in that the realism of the lore is there, after all howmany extremely creative orcs that make wonderful swords(not those ugly blunt ass scimitars they make in the movies, those are not well made at all) in any LOTR material(books/movies).
J: you can't survive enemies agroing you just by "running" an area like you can in WoW where just about nothing can run faster than a player. I've been charged down by an angry predator hit with a speed debuff and eaten alive in areas where i was way way too weak to be in (IE misty mountainst at level 10 as an elf hunter) all i can say is, PAIN!!!!!!!!!!!! also they made a fairly good run at avoiding the whole "cloning/ressurecting" difficulty since there are no instances of any of those things in the literature or the movies by replacing HP with morale, you just Retreat back to a safe spot(run like a schoolgirl) it counts as a defeat gives you a dread type debuff lowering your maximum morale for awhile(after all how happy you gonna feel after getting your ass handed to ya) also you get dread just for being near really dangerouse creature(cuz how are you going to feel when you're staring down a Nazgul or a troll, not too good i'm betting)
making you easier to kill... meaning that you gotta be careful and grouping to fell mighty foes is a wise Idea, rather than all these stupid fantasy games where a big guy can go around nuking hellishly powerful stuff all by his lonesome.
I know it's a long post but I could make it longer as there are at least 10 more things i could add to that list, i think however that I don't need to.
so without further ado.
[end rant]
I guess from now on every MMO will be a WoW clone according to some people.
I played WoW from US release (Nov 04) until a few weeks ago. I have also played LOTRO since
Beta 1 (Sept 06). I know a few things about both games.
The funny thing is that most of the beta testers wanted things added that resemble WoW.
Node tracking is the biggest similarity to WoW.
If this is a WoW clone like everyone said, then the Clone sure has more features than the original.
If WoW would add unlockable titles through deeds, crafting tiers, areas that change after you did
a quest (not like AQ gates), and conjunctions, then it would be a better game.
I think it's time for me to start reading the WAR is a WoW clone threads again. Some people think
Blizzard invented MMOs.
WoW was the first MMO that allot of people played due to allot of the people who played wow as a first mmo heard about it from a friend or someone who plays it. just due to it's inherent popularity because of blizzard already having a huge following from their previous releases. it tends to taint the majority's viewpoint allot.
I personally find that it's not as fun as the strategy games that spawned it...
simply put Blizzard is the company that has effectively ripped off every other created genre in existence... they were even sued by Games Workshop due to the unbridled similarities between their marines and space marines...