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2 hours - 2 toons - 2 levels - 2 minutes review
Siyah
Member Posts: 131
Downloaded via Steam (few hours download) and installation, setup, patching went as planned.
Below is my 2 minutes review for 2 hours of game play trying 2 toons in 2 different starter towns. Keep in mind this 2 hours of game time on 2 toons, leveling to level 2 and trying 2 starter towns out of the 10 (or so) available.
------------------------------------ 2 minutes review ------------------------------------
Introduction:
- I was very positively surprised with the introduction process. Creating toon is somewhat basic (predefined portraits library, hair, ... a la "guild wars") but has enough options (tattoos, piercings).
- The learning of the game's mechanic is nicely done through a very plausible scenario in progress which you join to help. The end of it (which I won't spoil) is where you get to "enter" the open apocalyptic world.
- Peformance on my rig (1920x1200) GTX285, 4GB Ram, Core 2x3.16GHz) was very good throughout the introduction (100+ fps).
- You will get to choose where you want to spawn in the open world. Each spawn point seems to be a starter town with a specific focus (combat/crafting/support). This does not mean you can craft if you spawn in a combat town, but I found more recipes to learn right away (through quests and vendors) in the crafting town.
The positives I saw in 2 hours
+ Customization of your character is very impressive. There are dozens of stats such as stamina, dexterity, endurance, perception, rifle, pistol, .... There are also predefined "suggested" profile templates (classes?) available and they show you where you should spec, they don't force you to spec that way. For instance, selecting Enforcer shows a marker in the stats you should invest in, but you are free to ignore and skill up something else.
+ First time i see a game with so much flexibility in the equipment you can wear and carry. You can buy a blue glove, a red glove and wear them both. Items dont seem to be sold in pair, so you look as you want to. You can change your hair (toon passes his/her hands through the hair a few times). You can wear/take off anything you have. But you can't hide something you wear...makes sense.
+ You can carry weapons on the your legs, belt, backx2. I had a crossbow, a huge pipe, 2 clubs, 2 pistols, all showing at once and available through mouse click or ctrl+0...9. You can carry the crossbow on your back and 1 or 2 pistols in hand for instance.
+ FIghting was intuitive. It's not COD, but right click = 1 action, left click = other action, r = reload. So when holding 2 guns you right and left click alternatively to shoot the one you want. WHen one or both are empty, reload (if ammo are in the bag).
+ Crossbow reloading, guns, pistol reloading all have different animations. Nicely done.
+ Crafting is intuitive and requires both many items and time (1 minute to make a bandage...but you don't wait for it, you start and timer goes on). I could stack up 5 bandages very easily.
+ Mobs dont drop nearly as many gear as other mmos. THey mostly drop "stuff", craft or sell. They did drop a few things like 1 belt, 1 bandana, some ammo (killing people, not animals). The rate was acceptable enough that I felt like killing a few extra to hope i'd get a piece of gear
+ Immersion is clearly supported as you can go from 3rd person to 1st person view and still have a 3D model for the weapon you use (e.g. crossbow+reload animation available in both views). The atmosphere does feel like Fallout 3 (only one i played). THe quests seem to have a meaning (at level 2...so caution there).
+ Animations are nicely done. They're not the best out there, but running, walking, ... are fluid. I had one concern with strafing...it does not feel natural to me, but not a deal breaker.
+ Saw horses and quad bikes very early on. All you need is cash to buy them and buy the gas/feeds to get them going.
The negatives I saw in 2 hours
- PER FOR MANCE. On my rig it all works fine even with everything maxed up. However it is easy to see that the engine needs some optimization. Rendering of the scenes (drawing distance for grass, bushes for instance) is visible. Viewing distance overall is good, but I could feel that something was not right in some cases. The 2nd starter town i chose had a lot more buildings, my rig struggled a bit there. I deffragg'ed the HDD and tried again: much better, but still visible.
- There was no sound for the vehicle I tried in the introduction (wont' spoil name/purpose).
- Music.... hmmm. I can't find the music. There is a light background atmosphere theme playing, but for those looking for a new game soundtrack to buy, you will be disappointed.
- The stats? I did not read the manual, nor do I plan to. I'll look up on google. However, the introduction should touch on the basic stats (all of them have tooltips mind you).
Conclusion
This was 2 minutes review as I had 2 minutes to spare. 2 more things to add:
+ This is a keeper for me provided there is content, gear variety and immersion beyond the 30 days.
- Performance must be addressed or many won't enjoy the game to its true potential.
Thanks for reading!
Comments
A few notes:
You can hold down the buttons and they will continually fire, so no need to alternate fire or continually click.
You didn't mention first person melee view.
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I'd definitely like to see your 30 day review because I think your views will have changed dramatically.
Dude! They totally borked the ATV sound last patch. It used to have sound, but it doesn't anymore. They added in a whole bunch more action sounds and they probably messed up the ATV. I'm pissed too. lol It used to have sound, I swear.
And who listens to MMO music anyway?
I do think that they have a PipBoy like radio thing on the chopping block for additions. I'm not 100% on that though.
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Thx TheHatter, I was convinced there had to be sound for ATV.
I am sure the performance problem will be corrected, it is only the first week of launch, so now all the servers are getting their first population tests.
Starter towns simply affect what type of environment you start out in. Crafting towns will have tons of scavenging nodes and quests will revolve around recipe books, while combat towns have more quests with weapons or armor rewards. Support towns will have quests with skill books as rewards. But all the towns will have some of everything and honestly, you should do at least 2 starter towns before making your way to Embry or Oilville. This will put you at around lvl 7 or so.
So far, I'm enjoying the game immensely, except for the constant crashes every time I go to a town
It has to be a memory leak, which I'm sure will get resolved.
I've come to the realization however that I need a friend or 2 in the game. I'm lonely! And I have questions, lots of questions, yet Newbie chat is pretty much a disaster right now. So despite any attempts made to use it, there's just too much spam and lag QQ going on.
(FYI, No lag, at all, no system lag either, other than the crashes when I enter towns, the game is 100% smooth).
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And who listens to MMO music anyway?
I listen to MMO music if its a fantasy game cuz. Listening to Ska/Punk, Indie Rock kills the immersion for me because the music wasn't even invented yet. But with FE Im actually going to eventually start plugging in my iPod and listening to some tunes cuz since its a sci fi futuristic setting so its all good.
On the subject of music, the game has plenty. Just go and spend some time hanging around South Burb and you hear some lovely music. It seems like there are times when very little music is heard when out in the wilderness, but when you're in the towns there is often some music playing.
This is one of my pet peeves. Why does every clown always assume a memory leak is the root of their problem? And in this instance, how the hell does 'crashing when you enter a town' equate to a memory leak?
When you are entering an area that is resource intensive, do you think that, just maybe, it might be an overloading of your system, whether it is your NIC or your RAM, or even your hard drive? It's quite possible any of these scenarios is true, but the likelihood of it being a memory leak with that kind of symptom is pretty low as it doesn't fit what a memory leak actually is.
Yeah, NPC is pretty spammy. Use region for questions and you'll find people will answer your questions. Most have turned NPC off, so pretty much the only ones on are GMs, the hazmat team and a whole bunch of noobies.
Heh, does it really bother you that much?
I'm kinda curious what the average gamer thinks a memory leak is.
edit:
heh I made a thread
www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/253596/Memory-Leaks-You.html
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This game has been crazy intense on preformance since early alpha. I got a steady 11 fps on a system that runs Age of Conan on mostly high settings with full shadows (dx9). I would not assume this will be fixed soon considering it never changed in the years I was in alpha-beta
Do not attempt to play this game if you have anything other then a serious gaming rig with atleast 4 gig memory and 3mhz processor.
It does not look good enough to warrant such a insane amount it uses. This game needs massive amounts of streamlining to the engine especially since it's FPS.
SHOHADAKU
Going to have to disagree with you partialy anyways, I got a gaming rig and home office PC with an nvidia 8800 and a 2.4 dual core and 4 gig of value ram, nothing flash , and game doesnt run that much differently than my gaming rig, there is still work to be done with the game engine, on that score I agree.
Performance has been increased every patch they appear to be going for a carefull appraoch, overall apart from the engine still having growing pains, i,m having fun least ways, when the lag gets to be a bitch, I just log off for a few, and err like do some work on the office PC.
Question at this stage to ask, is anything so far making me want to ditch the game before the 30 days are up, so far, its a resounding no, the growing pains of this release to me do not out weigh the pro,s of this game, however as someone has so rightly said, its the upper lvls a month or so down the track, that are the real game litmus test.