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What is unique about this game?
Maybe someone can explain to me what makes this game so unique. An extra method for leveling (study) is that it? There are some creatures I have not seen in other games, but the style of the artwork looks like a copy of another well-known game. The game is being advertised as being unique, but maybe they use that word in a diffferent meaning, because I do not see anything unique about this game. In fact it looks more like a poor copy of another game.
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Delanor
Comments
Nothing.
You know what there is a little Alganon icon near the name of the game at the header and just a bit to the left of it. Try clicking that and following the official link to the website were a host of information can be found....shocking isn't it? Now if you did all of that already, then there is absolutely nothing I can show you that will convince you it deserves to be labeled unique. That is something left for people who have a genuine interest for the game (you know...those people that actually make an effort to research the games they intend to check out....).
But since you have obviously already have came to the conclusion that it bears a striking resemblance to another game that you may or may not like or don't play anymore, there is no reason to feint curiosity for it. And if I happen to be completely off my rocker (which I've been known to be quite often) the I offer you a list of some of the things that piqued my interest (as well as my apologies in advance):
We start with a base familiarity you are accustomed to in MMOs, and then build from there an offering of a number of innovative systems such as The Library, Studies, Families, Deities, and a Hybrid Character Progression System. The overall "difference" that we hope to offer with ALGANON is that of total interaction and world immersion supportive of a pace you enjoy most.
Deities actually walk the world in ALGANON and protect their followers. Specific realms of the world are under constant conflict for deity control. The patrons of those deities either gain or lose special powers based on what realm they are in and which deity controls it.
The Library system is innovative; a grand repository of knowledge that can be accessed by any player to gain insight into the world - from within the game itself! These are just a few of the features that set ALGANON apart from other MMOGs. We encourage you to read the "Features" section to familiarize yourself with the others!
And to the gentleman with the one worded response: Please tighten you sphincter just a liiiittle more......then I can turn you into a human diamond factory.
"Small minds talk about people, average minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas."
Your assumption that I did not visit the official Alganon site and read the information and the forum there does not help me get to understand what makes this game special, what urged the developers to make this game. The things that are told and cited by you remain vague to me and I wonder how they will implement the promised features. From what I am being told I get no impression what the game will be like, and I am more than a bit bewildered that some people seem to see what I do not. That and only that peaks my interest. That might irritate you but does not bring me an answer. For the moment I remain skeptical. When the question remains unanswered I will think twice before trying this game.
I did like the enthusiasm the devs showed for their home made development environment. If only they showed the same enthousiam in explaining their game to the public.
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Delanor
Your assumption that I did not visit the official Alganon site and read the information and the forum there does not help me get to understand what makes this game special, what urged the developers to make this game. The things that are told and cited by you remain vague to me and I wonder how they will implement the promised features. From what I am being told I get no impression what the game will be like, and I am more than a bit bewildered that some people seem to see what I do not. That and only that peaks my interest. That might irritate you but does not bring me an answer. For the moment I remain skeptical. When the question remains unanswered I will think twice before trying this game.
I did like the enthusiasm the devs showed for their home made development environment. If only they showed the same enthousiam in explaining their game to the public.
The thing you have to realize is those of us that are charged with the notion of defining what unique means to you is folly. That's like telling a stranger to pick a number between 1-1000 and leaving the burden of honesty in the hands of the one asking, while we the guessers are left spending more time debating of you're truly being honest about our answers.
This is why 90% of the people who lurk on these boards ignore threads like this and 10% of the rest, like me, try to point out that coming to your OWN conclusion is your best solution. If you don't find something within a game that does not suit your taste or live up to your definitions of terms used, please restrain from turning to those who do seem to take interest into pitchmen for the game. I am not here to convince anyone to part from their time or money to play any particular game. I have a hard enough time trying to convince myself of the same thing.
And the only thing left that I can tell you is if you truly need convincing if you should pony up for this game I suggest you head to the official forums and create a thread there directed at the company itself......
"Small minds talk about people, average minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas."
Unique? Well, I guess if uniqueness as a whole comes from a blend of parts, then any game is unique...
Sure, Alganon has a lot of familiar components, but I guess thats not a bad thing... It gets experienced MMO payers in and playing with minimal fuss and, lets be honest, it never stopped people playing WoW after seeing EQ right? Despite it's recognisable hotbar combat and Q system, Alganon is offering a great evolution of many other not so-first-glance-obvious MMORPG systems that nonetheless define play.
It would be foolish to judge any game based on a few screenies, though I know people will.
At the very least I would give Alganon credit for it's utter emphasis on community, which marks it as pretty unique in this age of soulless solo quest grinders. I mean, solo content is fine, it should always be catered for, but it is very refreshing to see a game that looks like it 'gets' that community breeds longevity.
We will see how the challenge offered and group content shapes up as the game develops, but I personally as a social co-op based player have great hopes fpr this game.
And I would LOVE to see a indie Dev break through with a success offering something that the majors declare as 'dead' and 'unwanted'... Challenging co-op gaming in MMORPGs.
I hope you will not be disappointed. Thusfar I have seen them making this promise, but have no idea how serious they are about this promise. The form in which this promise will take shape is projected into the future by them. That makes me more then a little suspicious, and prevents me from taking too much interest in this game. I have seen too many promises made by game developers in the past that did not work out.
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Delanor
I hope you will not be disappointed. Thusfar I have seen them making this promise, but have no idea how serious they are about this promise. The form in which this promise will take shape is projected into the future by them. That makes me more then a little suspicious, and prevents me from taking too much interest in this game. I have seen too many promises made by game developers in the past that did not work out.
I understand where you are copming from, we have all been through the same wringer with devs over the past few years as they try to re-invent the wheel... It's enough to make anyone cynical about what they are told. I get that.
Certain aspects of this game give me hope though... the MyAlganon social app for instance clearly shows that Quest Online understand that building a community brings 'soul' to a mmorpg, with all that means (longevity etc).
Fingers crossed that this is actually followed through in game with lots of group content and inter-dependant systems, or it all will be for nothing... You only get community by play design in these games, no matter how many social apps you attach to it.
There are a dozen ez mode solo quest grinders out there... lets hope that a dev is finally wise enough to realise that, despite lazy fashionable modern thinking, a lot of people want something different.
What's new about this game is the 800 pixel wide, 250 pixel tall, nametags over things in the game... Have you seen the screenshots?
Let's just take a look at this screenshot, for example:
The character on the right is 176 pixels tall, 76 pixels wide. His name and level indicator are 171 pixels wide, 71 pixels tall.
Now, I'm no rocket scientist, but it looks to me that the nametags are almost as wide as the characters are tall. And if we get into the pig-thing on the left, I'd bet we could say it's as tall as his nametag is wide.
If these nametags are clickable areas, Alganon is going to be looking at a lock of problems with targeting and clicking things in sticky situations (combat) and in crowded areas (cities) if player character names are equally enormous by comparison.
According to the webiste, there is even a section called "Unique", which lists:
The Library
Both the Asharr and Kujix capital cities contain a grand library. Players who are contributing to the Library must contribute the information in person while Access to the Library is available from anywhere within the game via the User Interface. Through this interface, players can research items, creatures, magic, tradeskills, and learn about the history of the world and what families, guilds, and people have made amazing achievements. These libraries serve as the central hub of information for each side.
Deities & Crusades
Multiple gods allow characters to represent different powers, teachings and knowledge. This also allows for additional community interaction as well as conflict throughout the world. One player who declares patronage to a specific deity may find that in a certain part of the world, the creatures are drawn to destroy them with much more ferocity than another.
Crusades are the conquering wars that are declared by deities and their followers. Generally the most powerful followers of a deity declare the crusades, such as "wipe every orc from the face of the world", which may gain additional Karma for those who engage in the crusade. Crusades can also empower players; using the previous example, perhaps every character that is part of the religion that has declared the crusade against the orcs receives an additional damage modifier to all orcs for a period of time.
The Library sounds very much like a wiki, to be honest. As though the developers aren't going to create a manual, but would like the players to do it.
The Deities & Crusades bit sounds interesting, with paid employees of the company serving as Deities who roam the world starting crusades, huge multi-player events. The idea of players starting crusades sounds a bit strange to me, though. I imagine that only the most hard-core players will accumulate favor enough to be considered a "powerful follower". Don't like the sound of hard-core players calling the shots for others.
Nonetheless, it is does quite unique to the game.
Yes, they are adding more information on the website for some time now.
Factions are not really a new concept, but, when done the right way, can be fun. The library is a new concept as far as I know. Well not really, but it is new to have it in game instead of on a website, which is nice and in a way may lead (or already has led) to new concepts. More information will come available, no doubt.
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Delanor
Youve never played it so everything is unique.
You mean new, which is not the same thing.
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Delanor
Current state of beta is that basically none of the unique features are implemented yet.
The only feature which distinguishes Alganon from WoW circa 2004 that is implemented is the Study system.
Given that launch is supposedly in three weeks time either (a) all the promised unique features will be absent at launch; (b) some features will be rushed in and launched completely untested and broken; or (c) launch will be delayed.
But seriously, don't trust anything on the website when it comes to decided whether or not the game is going to be unique.
Can't really talk about the game because of the NDA, but I will say the game will not be ready in 3 weeks. A lot of issues still and they just added a major patch before hammering out older issues.
I was very disappointed with how things are being handled. I wish I could speak more about specific issues, but I won't until the NDA is lifted. I will probably pass on this game once it goes live if this is how the team plans on dealing with their game.
Hopefully the devs realize that the game needs more polish before going live and delays its release for about 6 months. I pray they know that all major features should be included and working on release day or they will lose many players after the first month. My recommendations to them would be,
1. delay launch
2.lower subscription cost, say to $7.50us.
3.Change look of ui so it is more UNIQUE.
Current state of beta is that basically none of the unique features are implemented yet.
You know this how?
The rest is your opinion. Not everyone shares it. I would wait until it's released to see what is in, what isn't, and the state it's in.
I just love the crystal Balls most people on this website carry around. Where can I get one?
I'm not an IT Specialist, Game Developer, or Clairvoyant in real life, but like others on here, I play one on the internet.
On this, I agree with you: wait until release. See the game. Don't, whatever you do, give them money until you've had a chance to evaluate the game, or at least see professional reviews of it. Trust me and my crystal ball on this.
Ok, I was beta testing this game...or rather I was trying to beta test this game. They are 3 weeks or less from going Live and they still have connection issues. Myself and many others cannot connect to their servers without massive lag or not at all. I myself have asked two different times for some assistance on their beta forums with no reply. I basically gave up tonight trying to log into their game and test. Every time I could log into the servers I would get such bad packet loss that it would disconnect me. Very disheartening to me since I was looking forward to helping work out the kinks on this game.
Don't get me wrong, the game looks amazing. I do agree that many features in the game look like carbon copies of World of Warcraft, though. I think the game has a ton of potential. I just can't believe that this close to live that they are having so many issues with people just logging into their servers. It would be different if I were the only one, but there are many people having the same issues.
I don't want to bad mouth the company, because I appreciate what their trying to accomplish. I honestly just think that besides the connectivity issues that the game needs more beta testing. A new patch was just released and it was a huge one with many new features. I seriously don't think they have the time to work out the kinks before they go Live. It almost makes me cringe to see them offering pre orders when the product right now seems like it needs at least months more testing. In all honesty this seems to me like how Cryptic did Champions. We told them the game wasn't ready for release and had many more issues, but they went live anyway and had all kinds of issues at launch.
Anyway, I had really high hopes for the game, but I cannot in good faith say the game is ready or even near ready for their live launch in 3 weeks.
Actuslly cryptic did listen, if im not mistaken they pushed the release date back more than a month to do more testing and well it was a fairly decent launch, ye first week was chaotic but they recovered fast. Also may i warn you that your totally breaching the NDA and QQL can take legal actions on it. Going from the forums though, alot of people are upset about the pricing and just the lack of info on the game, i mean there isnt even a video showing how combat or anything works just vids of places and like literally 2 week from release, its gonna hurt bad.
There is nothing in my post talking about their features. You CAN say your in beta tests. You just can't talk about the features and such that are being tested. I'm not worried about QQL and the NDA. I have not said anything except I cannot log into their game and they haven't tried to help at all to figure out the issue. I'm not worried.
As for Cryptic, your wrong. Champions should have stayed in beta another few months at the end and a lot of people told them so, but they were rushing it out (Not sure if it was Atari pushing them or what). The game had a rough start that first week and finally leveled out, but the game still had tons of problems.
There is nothing in my post talking about their features. You CAN say your in beta tests. You just can't talk about the features and such that are being tested. I'm not worried about QQL and the NDA. I have not said anything except I cannot log into their game and they haven't tried to help at all to figure out the issue. I'm not worried.
As for Cryptic, your wrong. Champions should have stayed in beta another few months at the end and a lot of people told them so, but they were rushing it out (Not sure if it was Atari pushing them or what). The game had a rough start that first week and finally leveled out, but the game still had tons of problems.
For the first part, read This
For the second part, The main point was that they listened. Either they pushed it back one week or one month is there choice or well there investors but when your that close to release with so much hype extending beta by months isnt ideal
Again, I'm not worried about it. I didn't break any NDA. Also, I uninstalled the game and don't plan on helping them any longer. As I stated I asked for help a few times on the forums with no reply back. After trying for the good part of a week it's just not worth it.
As for Cryptic and Champions. We just disagree.