I hate zoning and all that myself, it breaks the immersion... wish more games were like SWG or WOW with the seemless worlds.
While i like the idea of a open and seamless world i have no problem with zoning. It never bothered me in EQ and i doubt it will bother me in AOC if they have it.
I am less of a fan of instancing. I think instancing is ok for very small dungeons that cannot support more then one group. But bigger dungeons should be open to all and free game. Now making the dungeon its own zone so your computer only has to worry about the dungeon i am fine with. I want to see other people running around that are not in my group, and if that means i have to put up with ninja looters, kill stealers, camp checks and trains then im fine with it. I actually miss most of that stuff.
Instancing like EQ2 is ok i guess but i would rather outdoor areas were just one zone where everyone had to play in together. I dont really want to pick Outside 1 or Outside 2 when i zone in.
And Wow is far from seamless and it is very zoned, WoW just doesnt have hard lines at zones like EQ does. Try running up a hill at the edge of an area and see how far you get, i hope you dont hurt your face on the invisible wall, you still can only enter and exit an area from certain places i.e. zone lines. Seamless means you can go anywhere, and direction. People say SWG had that but i never played it, only game i have played that had it is Vanguard.
Yet another reason why I like to participate in beta, this helps me decipher subjective whining and objective observations. I'm sure Funcom has worked out the details of how instancing will work, once the NDA has expired or when Funcom makes a public announcement perhaps it will clear the confusion, but won't necessarily change the mind of the detractors.
The Old Timers Guild Laid back, not so serious, no drama. All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
WoW has zones. I'm not sure why people think it doesn't.
Huge expanses of nothingness between areas? That's a zone line oddly enough. With WoW's simple graphics, they don't have to go to a loading screen to load all new textures, because... all their textures are reused over and over again, just with different colors. A pig in the badlands is a pig in loch modan, a dwarf is a dwarf, etc.
Plus, every dungeon is zoned (and instanced). And you "zone" when travelling between continents.
WoW definitely has zones.
Seamless worlds are crap in my opinion. AC1? Crap world. Sure it was big, but it was boring. Randomly sprinkled NPC camps? Boring. SW:G same thing, except even LESS stuff than AC1. Vanguard? Well, I don't know about release, but when I played, it was a vast wasteland as well.
If that's the "benefit" of seamless, I'll stick with well crafted and designed zones and a loading screen, thanks. My immersion isn't ruined by a loading screen... any more than its ruined by having 1st/3rd camera views, text chat, and a freaking graphical UI over my "field of vision". Whoever claims loading screens ruins their immersion better play with their UI off or they are a hypocrit.
Why do you trust all the negative feedback given and not the positive feedback.
Seriously, I could say Im in beta and make an essay of why I think AoC will fail, and then 30 people will recite what I say as gospel and refernce that to 50 other forums. You know its fact, look at this very forum for all the crap being said thats simply not true. We have seen this behavior over and over about every mmo on the market. This website seems to be a cesspool of people telling each other why this game will fail and that game will rule.
I suggest everyone chill and wait and see whats released, unless you are all in the habit of letting people make your minds up for you.
Only game I see instancing done well is EVE. It's sort of a hidden intancing. It does create issues like when there are 1000 enemy in a system waiting for you all to jump in (yes I have seen fleets of 1000 and more). The lag you get from using the jumpgate when you enter system gives them an advantage.
It is however explainable and in my eyes realistic as EVE is everyone on 1 server. Computers have limits to what they can handle loadwise and EVE continues to push the bar.
I agree with those that say wait to see what AOC delivers when released.
I also see a trend in MMO to stray away from sandbox. I wonder what company is going to first realise if you make a kick ass sandbox people will flock to it like bees to a hive.
Instancing is understandable as servers have problems when thousands of people are all in the same place, but if you figure out how to do it, it will be the all sought after "Wow killer".
Grand theft auto broke many many records for sales not for it's theme, people love sandbox freedom. People love the ability to make their own in the game.
My problems with AOC come from the devs mouths. I HATE the fact there will be insta spawn on the battlefield for pvp city raids. That is very cheesy people can just die and run right back in when player cities are on the line. This fact alone will prob keep me from being a subscriber.
Insta spawn is for kiddie games and FPS type deathmatches. If the devs want that "adult" feel and as I quote from their video "The feeling like your friends are all dying around you" they need to make death in these pvp city battles at least send you away from the battle so you can't return ESPECIALLY with something as important as a player built city is on the line.
Comments
Well as long as AoC isnt like GW....fine with me
I am less of a fan of instancing. I think instancing is ok for very small dungeons that cannot support more then one group. But bigger dungeons should be open to all and free game. Now making the dungeon its own zone so your computer only has to worry about the dungeon i am fine with. I want to see other people running around that are not in my group, and if that means i have to put up with ninja looters, kill stealers, camp checks and trains then im fine with it. I actually miss most of that stuff.
Instancing like EQ2 is ok i guess but i would rather outdoor areas were just one zone where everyone had to play in together. I dont really want to pick Outside 1 or Outside 2 when i zone in.
And Wow is far from seamless and it is very zoned, WoW just doesnt have hard lines at zones like EQ does. Try running up a hill at the edge of an area and see how far you get, i hope you dont hurt your face on the invisible wall, you still can only enter and exit an area from certain places i.e. zone lines. Seamless means you can go anywhere, and direction. People say SWG had that but i never played it, only game i have played that had it is Vanguard.
People that say that they could never play a game with zoning have by all probability only played WoW
But go ahead, use that "go back to WOW" argument if you can't do better.
Yet another reason why I like to participate in beta, this helps me decipher subjective whining and objective observations. I'm sure Funcom has worked out the details of how instancing will work, once the NDA has expired or when Funcom makes a public announcement perhaps it will clear the confusion, but won't necessarily change the mind of the detractors.
The Old Timers Guild
Laid back, not so serious, no drama.
All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com
An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
WoW has zones. I'm not sure why people think it doesn't.
Huge expanses of nothingness between areas? That's a zone line oddly enough. With WoW's simple graphics, they don't have to go to a loading screen to load all new textures, because... all their textures are reused over and over again, just with different colors. A pig in the badlands is a pig in loch modan, a dwarf is a dwarf, etc.
Plus, every dungeon is zoned (and instanced). And you "zone" when travelling between continents.
WoW definitely has zones.
Seamless worlds are crap in my opinion. AC1? Crap world. Sure it was big, but it was boring. Randomly sprinkled NPC camps? Boring. SW:G same thing, except even LESS stuff than AC1. Vanguard? Well, I don't know about release, but when I played, it was a vast wasteland as well.
If that's the "benefit" of seamless, I'll stick with well crafted and designed zones and a loading screen, thanks. My immersion isn't ruined by a loading screen... any more than its ruined by having 1st/3rd camera views, text chat, and a freaking graphical UI over my "field of vision". Whoever claims loading screens ruins their immersion better play with their UI off or they are a hypocrit.
Why do you trust all the negative feedback given and not the positive feedback.
Seriously, I could say Im in beta and make an essay of why I think AoC will fail, and then 30 people will recite what I say as gospel and refernce that to 50 other forums. You know its fact, look at this very forum for all the crap being said thats simply not true. We have seen this behavior over and over about every mmo on the market. This website seems to be a cesspool of people telling each other why this game will fail and that game will rule.
I suggest everyone chill and wait and see whats released, unless you are all in the habit of letting people make your minds up for you.
Quoted For Truth.
Only game I see instancing done well is EVE. It's sort of a hidden intancing. It does create issues like when there are 1000 enemy in a system waiting for you all to jump in (yes I have seen fleets of 1000 and more). The lag you get from using the jumpgate when you enter system gives them an advantage.
It is however explainable and in my eyes realistic as EVE is everyone on 1 server. Computers have limits to what they can handle loadwise and EVE continues to push the bar.
I agree with those that say wait to see what AOC delivers when released.
I also see a trend in MMO to stray away from sandbox. I wonder what company is going to first realise if you make a kick ass sandbox people will flock to it like bees to a hive.
Instancing is understandable as servers have problems when thousands of people are all in the same place, but if you figure out how to do it, it will be the all sought after "Wow killer".
Grand theft auto broke many many records for sales not for it's theme, people love sandbox freedom. People love the ability to make their own in the game.
My problems with AOC come from the devs mouths. I HATE the fact there will be insta spawn on the battlefield for pvp city raids. That is very cheesy people can just die and run right back in when player cities are on the line. This fact alone will prob keep me from being a subscriber.
Insta spawn is for kiddie games and FPS type deathmatches. If the devs want that "adult" feel and as I quote from their video "The feeling like your friends are all dying around you" they need to make death in these pvp city battles at least send you away from the battle so you can't return ESPECIALLY with something as important as a player built city is on the line.
The video I am refering to is the one Devs are explaining the city raid pvp system at the convention on this site.LINK---> mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/setView/videos/gameID/191/videoId/1098
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