Dynamic content is the future of our genre. This genre has lost it's way. Forgotten what it originally was created to do. Mmorpgs were designed to let players play together in a game world, to have adventures with and conflicts against. When wow was introduced to our genre we lost our way. The genre took away the group adventuring and conflict and ushered players into nice safe instances like we were children being put into a playpen for our own safety. Dynamic content is how we take the genre back. Too discredit Trions attempt in innovating the genre with rifts is wrong IMO. It's a step in the right direction and as more companies evolve this mechanic Mmorpgs will finally be about worlds again, about community again and about working together or against one another outside a playpen. A dynamic world, the reason we started playing in this fucking genre.
You should at least watch the entire CGI trailer if your going to call it a WoW clone. Seriously.......
What does a CGI trailer have to do with anything? It doesn't offer any insight into how the game actually plays or any of it's mechanics so it can't offer anything to prove that it isn't a WoW clone.
As a thread asking those who consider it a WoW clone to direct the OP in another direction, ect ect. It would by default fall on those calling it a WoW clone to prove their claims, and not the other way around.
For the first time ever, I decided to do a tiny bit of research on the game. The rift mechanic I thought was sort of stupid at first, but apparently it has a few tricks I hadn't realized. So I will humour everybody with quite literally, the 'superior knowledge' I have over most of you with my 2 minutes of research...
1: Public grouping - Allows anyone to join a public group to work together in a rift location
2: Certain Items/drops gained in rifts can be used to turn in for trinkets and armor. Plus rifts give great exp, making it a method of leveling up altogether.
3: Rifts encourage group gameplay.
4: If left unchecked, a rift can consume an entire zone, making it much more difficult to get rid of. Not quite sure how getting rid of it works past that point.
Mostly me taking offense to this comment.
'So I will humour everybody with quite literally, the 'superior knowledge' I have'
Sorry, I meant no offense but to those who purely consider this a clone on the basis of their finite knowledge of the difference between the proverb 'reinventing the wheel', and 'authenticity'.
Namely, because you say this, after regaling everyone on how they haven't provided information on how the game mirriors others (you stated WoW in particular, which the modern incarnation of the WoW group system actually does work with a click for dungeons and can auto-group you for any normal quests you want too last I knew, so technically it does more).
The advancement in said rift system can be said to be that it is an open world environment that works as a group incentive mechanic. One I have not seen in any other MMORPG. I do not see the open world rift mechanic as a stolen idea, and in it's own, fairly unique, besides the name.
I say misinformed, because making the comment that people need to prove it's not a clone, then laying down bullet points implies that those points are examples. If those weren't points that were supposed to stand as differences in titles, then there's little to no point in making them in the first place. If they were set as a challenge, then you were just provided point that they were wrong.
It was a challenge that I wanted to be properly refuted, because I had not seen any well structed arguments to as why this can be seen as a clone of WoW like the OP had said.
As for the oldschool events versus the Rift events. Their nature of being self directing events means one of two things. Either the developers released free reign of the development of the servers to the AI, or the events operate within a finite context. From what I've understood, they operate within a finite context.
That's primarily how autopilot type mechanics work, they can only be as deep as the developers program it to be. In this case, it was to cater to a large audience with little to no manual intervention, a nice touch imo, but still lacking the unique element that a live event can bring.
The water won't become blood, no demons will take over the planet or empires, the gods the players may serve will likely never die.
The game is certainly a good step towards regaining true dynamic content. But the key word to me is 'regaining'.
We're far from where many games used to be, and it's just annoying to some of us that people applaud a game for being both half of what it could be as well as a mirror of things that all ready have been.
From the little that I know, I agree. I still wouldn't indiscriminately throw out a clone title like some others.
EDIT: Also, I'm sorry but I don't really like your edited in clone comment. As an artist and graphics designer, I see and deal with copyright and ripoffs all the time using excuses like that to justify it. The fact that people tracing art is so prolific even within the professional world is frustrating to a degree you wouldn't believe.
Depends on your basis. I see nothing as truly original in this market, even a slightest hint of inspiration from an idea, or influence, can cast away most originality, but what may spawn from it, to the creator of his own work through some level of ingenuity, is an authentic touch. It can be exploited, I agree, but again it depends to the degree.
Do you see Rift as exploiting, or as building off of successful ideas and throwing in a few of their own to make something authentic? That, would probably be subjective. I personally see it as a mixture. They take some blatent used ideas, mix it with some different, some used, and attempt to fuse it in different areas to make it authentic, while not neccesarily taking too large of risks. If anything, they are taking too little of risks. Yet it could be said that a larger risk could be needed for a success, or vice versa.
Just because some one modifies a tool you made, doesn't mean they have suddenly struck upon a new or 'authentic to the creator' design. It means they have repurposed, or even in the cases provided, done the same thing with a refitted replica of what one's all ready done.
I don't deal in absolutes when it comes to that matter.
I'm sure that the case of using these kind of mechanics is less of a twitch inducing slight than redrawing other peoples art, but it's certainly annoying to anyone who developed it and now see people waddling off to other titles that have copied their work.
Dynamic content is the future of our genre. This genre has lost it's way. Forgotten what it originally was created to do. Mmorpgs were designed to let players play together in a game world, to have adventures with and conflicts against. When wow was introduced to our genre we lost our way. The genre took away the group adventuring and conflict and ushered players into nice safe instances like we were children being put into a playpen for our own safety. Dynamic content is how we take the genre back. Too discredit Trions attempt in innovating the genre with rifts is wrong IMO. It's a step in the right direction and as more companies evolve this mechanic Mmorpgs will finally be about worlds again, about community again and about working together or against one another outside a playpen. A dynamic world, the reason we started playing in this fucking genre.
and than other games followed.. i remember when i first tried EQ2, there where an orc in the starting zone and you needed a group to kill him.. didnt take long before the whole thing got rewamped! =(
People do like the chalenge...and yet should be a fun type of a chalenge. We had that back in old days of wow and now many misses those times. Also, many players nowadays lack of free time. They work more hours per day for the same amount of money and when they got a free time to spare on gaming, they want to relax and enjoy the ride...not just feeling like they have to work hard time again. In few words, a game should be less grindy and yet chalenging. This is one of the features that Rift has: it's easy enough to level, but hard enough to keep you thrilled - rifting plus questing gives a large bonus to your XP gain per minut played; characters are versatile and could change roles fast enough to make you feel special in the world, and yet you end up in first dungeons to be hit by a simple feeling of "huh, that's a piece of cake"...but things are deciving, because it will end up to be the hardest "easy done" experience you'll get (even if you are a hardcore wow player, you'll notice that first dungeon in this game rises up to your expectation without getting annoyingly difficult or having to get to the endgame to finaly have some real intelectual fun in a dungeon)...in it's simpleness, this game manages to surprise even the exigent type of a player
Do you know what one of the good things are about a new game and starting out with others is like in a game that you can be reasonably guaranteed to have enough people to play with judging from the number of people enjoying it while you are betaing? It is the fun, camaraderie , busy atmosphere , crowd and general energy of a new game.
This is one of the main reasons I always try to start a new game at launch. Even when the game has quite bad bugs this is an important time frame in a game which you can never ever get back. Over time I have started City of Heroes, Everquest 2, WoW, FFXI when it launched in the States , Age of Conan, Dark Age of Camelot, Anarchy Online , Aion ,Vanguard and a few others I am sure missing from this list. Inevitably something made me leave these games but after coming back to them with the passage of time even when they have improved you cannot recapture that initial launch vibe. That is an important place to be in because in my opinion whatever fun there is to be had a lot of the initial excitement and expectations are highest when they launch. You cannot recreate that buzz.
I suppose Rift does not really offer anything new but what it offers me is a chance to partake in that initial excitement of a game that could be big. I am not talking about the aspirations of some Indy game those do not garner that much of an audience I am talking about games that because of their clone status has its own following. It is not really written somewhere that you cannot enjoy clones or even games that do not bring anything new but merely copy things so well from an amalgam of games. That is not a problem I think here. What we have is that many people are fed up with the lack of creativity and their inability to accept what is currently being offered. Add that to them taking offense that others are trying to laud the games they consider cheap knock offs. So they come here and attempt to pee on our collective bowl of cheerios.
In a way I am a little glad that I have not yet lost the love for this genre or try so hard to look for innovation I am happy to enjoy the initial rush. Will I leave ? Perhaps but in the interim I am not going to over analyse any game I happen to like and chip away at the game and get unhappy in the process. I look forward to adventuring with my fellow lovers of this genre and I hope for some good time together even if it is for 3 months.
The more I hear about the soul system the more I think of EQ AA's just done in a different way, as to the public quests it is getting done to death in most the new games that have just come out and are coming out. As to multi classing, that just tends to lead to broken builds in a game. When I was going to download Rift's beta client my best friend told me he had quit the beta to go back to EQ, bad graphics, dated play style, and all. So instead I am waiting until a month after launch of the game to make any decision on playing it. I just felt that the running around screaming omg it is awsome way better than everything else was a bit much. So far it has taken game play mechanics of other games that required active gm participation and automated it. It has taken the talent trees of other games, converged it with EQ's AA system to make something newer and admitedly cooler, and lastly it has worked on making public quests better. Until luanch we won't know how well the game will do. Stamping your foot over and over and shouting rift is awsome everyone else shut up is just counter productive. Enjoy your game, sign up to the beta, and chill out.
You are not going to find one till swtor or gw2 releases.You may play dcuo and have great fun for a while but thats it.It's not going to keep you more than a month entertained
Sorry, I meant no offense but to those who purely consider this a clone on the basis of their finite knowledge of the difference between the proverb 'reinventing the wheel', and 'authenticity'.
And while I agree with you that those who think that are not sufficiently knowledgeable, I do not see them as wholly incorrect either.
The advancement in said rift system can be said to be that it is an open world environment that works as a group incentive mechanic. One I have not seen in any other MMORPG. I do not see the open world rift mechanic as a stolen idea, and in it's own, fairly unique, besides the name.
Under that context it's the same as the public quests of WAR, only with the ability to be scooted to a different corner of any given zone. The variety garnered from them is a tradeoff, because instead of making a unique questline that can affect the zone with it's outcome it's one of a set of open ended quests that repeat themselves randomly in any zone. It gives up unique narrative for dynamic placement.
Point there however is the same intent is achieved with the same fundamental mechanic, be it through a different gimmick.
It was a challenge that I wanted to be properly refuted, because I had not seen any well structed arguments to as why this can be seen as a clone of WoW like the OP had said.
The OP related it as an amalgam clone. I certainly agree it isn't a clone of WoW in the fullest sense, but I have experienced much of what people are seeing as what I'd call more 'too familiar'. The same hotbar combat mechanics. The same general UI toolit. The same general strategy to mobs and AI. ETC.
It's less of a rip on Rift to me as much as it's a rip on the genre. It's why almost every game that creeps up is called a WoW clone or ripoff of some other game. Too much of the inner workings of the game have been exposed to players from past experiences that they look at the new titles and pick apart the details.
That's primarily how autopilot type mechanics work, they can only be as deep as the developers program it to be. In this case, it was to cater to a large audience with little to no manual intervention, a nice touch imo, but still lacking the unique element that a live event can bring.
I agree on the 'nice touch'. But like other games I still see it as a rehashing of older gaming mechanics and in many regards as 'not enough'. Like I mentioned as it being a different gimmick applied to the same fundamental mechanic behind War's public quests. A decent step in the right direction, but not enough and as a result it only serves to remind me of the much more dynamic content that I once experienced as a staple of a title.
From the little that I know, I agree. I still wouldn't indiscriminately throw out a clone title like some others.
No comment. I agree.
Depends on your basis. I see nothing as truly original in this market, even a slightest hint of inspiration from an idea, or influence, can cast away most originality, but what may spawn from it, to the creator of his own work through some level of ingenuity, is an authentic touch. It can be exploited, I agree, but again it depends to the degree.
Do you see Rift as exploiting, or as building off of successful ideas and throwing in a few of their own to make something authentic? That, would probably be subjective. I personally see it as a mixture. They take some blatent used ideas, mix it with some different, some used, and attempt to fuse it in different areas to make it authentic, while not neccesarily taking too large of risks. If anything, they are taking too little of risks. Yet it could be said that a larger risk could be needed for a success, or vice versa.
I see Rift as people taking zero risk by trying to do the same thing from a different angle. They have a novel face, but in a way 'knowing too much' spoils my ability to see the game as unique or innovative because I have seen what has been consequently know what can be done if people would actually take the risk.
I don't deal in absolutes when it comes to that matter.
Not clear on that argument.
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Rfit is a good game. My only complain is that the movement speed has to be faster! I am not asking for another DCUO super hero speed, but at least not like what I played so far in beta. Is too slow....
If they fix it, then .... I'll be buying this game for sure!! (I am buying it anyway lol)
Problem with most people here is they are looking for their first mmo fix that they will never find, some ppl are trying to sell DAoC 2 like that will ever happen, cause obviously that was their first MMO and they really want the feeling they had on those outdated games and because they dont get it they will scream and shout.
Well it aint gonna happen no matter how hard you try, even going back to these games you realize how flawed and broken they were and its true, DAoC, Vanila WoW, UO, T4C, Lineage, Lineage 2, they were fun but were broken games that didnt keep up with the times and after they are gone ppl can only look at them through rose coloured glasses, trying to chase that first mmo fix by thinking that somehow DAoC 2 will fix it, you will be thoroughly disappointed if they ever make a sequel of that.
Back on topic, Rift is a polished game, it is as good as Aion was, honestly it is up there, one thing it has over Aion is it wasnt built for the eastern market, some ppl just cant stand that I personally I am ok the way they play their games but in the west its hard for the general population to accept some of the ways they play.
Beta was fun, it offers a new setting of MMO with some added features and a new design, which tbh has been the norm on all MMO's that have come out, now personally I am interested not only in combat and quests and next gen but in everything as a whole, and rift will fill that game in the meantime the sum of the parts does create a good MMO.
I played the beta this week and am very tempted to buy. I have only one problem with it. If you don't get in game in the first wave of sales, how will the game fair with diminished group numbers closing rifts, as players move on. It was great for a week but how will it fair 3 months after release?
I played the beta this week and am very tempted to buy. I have only one problem with it. If you don't get in game in the first wave of sales, how will the game fair with diminished group numbers closing rifts, as players move on. It was great for a week but how will it fair 3 months after release?
I was lucky enough to log in around 4am two days ago on a low pop pvp shard. I was in the 9-20 defiant freemarch zone and every rift that popped started off soloable. As more can to help the phases of the rift would add more and more mobs as if it scaled to te amount of people contributing to each stage. The amount of rifts spawning were less. About one every few minutes and invasions were also easily taken care of with my lone cleric. All in all with a mix of questing and rifts the whole three hour experience went smoothly. I did have a fog of war bug on my big screen map but I believe I timed rift spawns at 10 per-hour with extremely low activity which is wonderful.
I played the beta this week and am very tempted to buy. I have only one problem with it. If you don't get in game in the first wave of sales, how will the game fair with diminished group numbers closing rifts, as players move on. It was great for a week but how will it fair 3 months after release?
All content is supposed to scale, for population in a given area...How well this works....I have been able to solo a rift/invasion before, but their have been times when something spawned, people left to go somewhere else, and it spawned for the higher number of people....then you get it turning into a foothold/invasion and you can't solo it, but you can pick off some mobs and probably get help to close them.
Only time will tell, but the mechanic is in place to account for it, consistant execution is the part that remains to be seen.
I was trying Earthrise out too, but the zones crashed like every 3 minutes, was a little fustrating for a game that is I think 2 days from a head start launch and less than a week from regular launch....Still gonna try to tough the crashing out to get a look at it. I like complex crafting and sandbox games.
Also all these people complaining abouyt clones, i sure hope your young and never pc gamed in the 90s, calls thats pretty much all there was.
I remember when it was all feilds;)
Seriously though. People expect more now nowadays. You are right though. Games where pretty much the same when I was a lad, playing on my Amstrad cpc 464. I think we forget this is a genre of games. It's like platform games back in the 90's. When you bought one you knew what you where going to get. Despite how many new and inovative features it had on the back of the box. They all played pretty much the same and took the best features of whatever was the top seller at the time. Mmorpg's or all other types of games are no diferent. If people see them all as clones maybe they don't like the respective genre as much as they think they do.
I just got done playing Rift's latest beta event and I will admit that this game isn't bad. As a matter of fact it is pretty good. I only got to level 18 or so, mostly soloing to get an idea of what the game is without zooming through and only did one PvP event which worked out pretty good and was a lot of fun.
My personal accessments is that the game really is what WoW could be if they had enough respect for their player base to actually update the game instead of just expanding it. Both games have almost identical UI's so I have to assume they are using either the same game engine or very similar ones. Here is my personal Pros and Cons for it:
Pros: good animations, good art style (not my personal preference but still good), very good graphics, dynamic rift events, and an interesting class system.
Cons: same yes/no to quests so very little real choice, too frequent rift events, poor quality character customization (including the choice of races and body styles to play), and a crafting system that does not make sense for the game.
Let's face it, there is very few times in our ordinary lives that we only have yes or no choices, so seeing this as the only choices in a game gets a little tedious. Is it too much to ask to add a bit of depth to the questing system by making more than two choices?
While the rift events were very dynamic, they also were so frequent that it got a little annoying just trying to travel between quests. Often there is a fine line between enough and too much of a good thing, but I personally think the developers totally disregarded that line and just decided to pack as many in there as possible and thereby are reducing the effectiveness of this feature of the game.
The character customization bothered me because I purposely went with a look I figured very few other people would go with, but the choices were so limited that I saw three other toons that looked EXACTLY like me in the first twenty minutes of play time. I will admit to being spoiled by the extraordinary character customization of "City of Heroes" though.
That crafting system is what bothers me the most about the game I think. I will grant the developers that if there was no crafting system, people would scream bloody murder over it, but it just does not make sense. Why would souls specifically resurrected by the Gods, to save the world, be interested in crafting? That is where the story and the game mechanics for me just do not mesh well.
The voice work introducing the game was very poorly done in my opinion. I did not list it as a Con though because the rest of the voice work was good and the beginning sequence will only be viewed by people once or twice at the most.
Overall, it is a good game that needs more polishing before it will be considered better than good by me. Still, I would be more much comfortable suggesting Rift to friends interested in trying a new game than WoW. Having played WoW for a while now, I just see Rift as a much better alternative.
"If half of what you tell me is a lie, how can I believe any of it?"
Well thank you for recommending AoC. Before I go ahead and download a trial (im serious I need something to play) I want to ask does AoC offer dynamic content. See, I need something too mask the terrible quest progression that's virtually destroyed this sub-genre and rift does a good job of masking it. Also does AoC offer a class system even remotely as flexible?
Why don't you spend more time playing Rift and less time on this website worrying about what other people think about the game?
Well thank you for recommending AoC. Before I go ahead and download a trial (im serious I need something to play) I want to ask does AoC offer dynamic content. See, I need something too mask the terrible quest progression that's virtually destroyed this sub-genre and rift does a good job of masking it. Also does AoC offer a class system even remotely as flexible?
Why don't you spend more time playing Rift and less time on this website worrying about what other people think about the game?
Can't play rift right now the event is over smart guy.
Why do you think i want them to point me to this imaginary game thats better than rift and offers the same features...
I was reading this thread at work and it made me wonder. Rift is a good game in it's own right. It does what it does correctly, but don't go beyond.
Was really hyped after the 3rd beta test, i pre-ordered it. Fourth beta test, my enthusiasm went down, I don't know what it was, I spent a lot of time trying to figure it out, but still had some fun. On the fifth beta test, played one day then I found myself re-installing and playing Final Fantasy XIV.
The rifts and invasion are nothing spectacular for me. Wasn't I defending Al Zhabi from beastmen invasions in 2006? Those beastmen would capture npcs and we would have to go fetch them back if we didn't defend the town properly. While I was playing more and more, I would find rifts to be a nuisance, I would not even want to participate in them. It's all a zerg to kill mobs. In events, at least in the 4th beta, no need to group up to get xp and loot. Overall it was just disturbing the very linear questing. At least in WoW, you could go to another zone to level if you wished it.
Now lets see the Ascended Class System. While at first I found it amazing, I now question it. A lot of the "talents" overlapse, all the attacks do similar damage aside from being a different element type. To me it now feels like lets take AoE healing make it one soul, HoT healing make it one soul. Honestly in other games, it would have been grouped together and less redundant. It is good to change role on the fly. But still, in FFXI I had 20 jobs offered to me, but we had to level them all to gain some benefits for our sub job. Even in FFXIV, you can level all your jobs and mix and match abilities you want. So the ACS is not another strong point for me.
But the worst for me is Rift is another solo fest game, where it will be hard to make a good connection and friendship just like in WoW. While you may say public grouping will make groups, yes they will, but will you have time while in them to really get to know your fellow players? Heck Rift gave me the taste to start FFXI all over again.
Well thank you for recommending AoC. Before I go ahead and download a trial (im serious I need something to play) I want to ask does AoC offer dynamic content. See, I need something too mask the terrible quest progression that's virtually destroyed this sub-genre and rift does a good job of masking it. Also does AoC offer a class system even remotely as flexible?
Why don't you spend more time playing Rift and less time on this website worrying about what other people think about the game?
Can't play rift right now the event is over smart guy.
Why do you think i want them to point me to this imaginary game thats better than rift and offers the same features...
You've been drinking the kool-aid lately Rock, just because Rift might be better than anything else from your perspective being at the top of a hill of bad doesn't make the game good, at least in many foiks eyes.
The game they want may not exist, doesn't mean they'll accept what Rift has to offer, they'll actually just chose to not play for now. (and of course, complain bitterly on these forums)
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
Ok, sure they have taken a lot of stuff from the mighty cartoon game WoW. They have also taken stuff from other games. Thats how it works. You take the good parts that people like.
I don't see anything wrong with that. You see same thing happen with other products like phones, cars, TV etc. What you don't see is people going "ohh a Volvo clone!!! omfg!!!"...
BUT, what they could do in Rift is try make it look more different. I mean for example in WoW you have the dots around the NPC's avatar where you build up your attack.... same in Rift... why not just change the design on that? It can be same function but why must they make it look the same?
Rift is a new game, so why not make a new look on the UI? Do they need to use grey color like WoW and other games? No, but they do. HP bars look the same etc.
Here they could have made the game look so much different. Trick the people that it's not a WoW clone...
Why not take the HP bar from Dead Space or something? Or something close to that. Something that look new!
Rift is not a bad game, but they need to change the design on stuff.
Well thank you for recommending AoC. Before I go ahead and download a trial (im serious I need something to play) I want to ask does AoC offer dynamic content. See, I need something too mask the terrible quest progression that's virtually destroyed this sub-genre and rift does a good job of masking it. Also does AoC offer a class system even remotely as flexible?
Why don't you spend more time playing Rift and less time on this website worrying about what other people think about the game?
Can't play rift right now the event is over smart guy.
Why do you think i want them to point me to this imaginary game thats better than rift and offers the same features...
You've been drinking the kool-aid lately Rock, just because Rift might be better than anything else from your perspective being at the top of a hill of bad doesn't make the game good, at least in many foiks eyes.
The game they want may not exist, doesn't mean they'll accept what Rift has to offer, they'll actually just chose to not play for now. (and of course, complain bitterly on these forums)
Kyleran this is like the EVE forums all over again. People bashing a game that hardly got out of the tutorial.
Similar to EVE, Rift does not come into its own until 10-15 levels in. Before that your stuck with one spec that looks exactly like WoWs system, doing basic quests designed for non-mmo gamers in a small cramped zone.
They log off after they see that and then write entire 1000+ word reviews as if they played the game since Beta1.
Its just like the EVE forums and I wouldnt stand it then and I wont stand for it now.
Yeah... That must be it. Because once that new car smell leaves suddenly all the games Rift "cloned" will suddenly have dynamic content and flexibility in their class systems and rivals most sandbox games...
Dynamic content? pfft, random public quests and arcade like monster invasions. Those will grow old and will wither and die just like WAR's PQs.
Class flexibility that rivals most sandbox games? No, you have quite a bit of options but only a handful that actually work well together, and even then, you're still locked into certain classes and rolls.
That's all Rift brought to the table. Randomized PQs and multiclassing. Everything else has been done before (and better) in other games.
You know I am going to have to chime in, because to much BS is being slung around. First off does Rift's quest do it better than say WoW's quest? You say no. I say yes. Why do I say yes. Simple answer. If I have to go get 5 crystal shards from Fae Faeries in Rift - I kill five - I get five shards in Rift. In WoW I need 5 talons from purple drakes. I need to kill upwards of 30 drakes and I will finally get the drops I need to get my 5 talons. That is the difference. One is a tedious time-sink - the other isn't.
Comments
Mmorpgs will finally be about worlds again, about community again and about working together or against one another outside a playpen. A dynamic world, the reason we started playing in this fucking genre.
Playing: Rift, LotRO
Waiting on: GW2, BP
and than other games followed.. i remember when i first tried EQ2, there where an orc in the starting zone and you needed a group to kill him.. didnt take long before the whole thing got rewamped! =(
People do like the chalenge...and yet should be a fun type of a chalenge. We had that back in old days of wow and now many misses those times. Also, many players nowadays lack of free time. They work more hours per day for the same amount of money and when they got a free time to spare on gaming, they want to relax and enjoy the ride...not just feeling like they have to work hard time again. In few words, a game should be less grindy and yet chalenging. This is one of the features that Rift has: it's easy enough to level, but hard enough to keep you thrilled - rifting plus questing gives a large bonus to your XP gain per minut played; characters are versatile and could change roles fast enough to make you feel special in the world, and yet you end up in first dungeons to be hit by a simple feeling of "huh, that's a piece of cake"...but things are deciving, because it will end up to be the hardest "easy done" experience you'll get (even if you are a hardcore wow player, you'll notice that first dungeon in this game rises up to your expectation without getting annoyingly difficult or having to get to the endgame to finaly have some real intelectual fun in a dungeon)...in it's simpleness, this game manages to surprise even the exigent type of a player
Do you know what one of the good things are about a new game and starting out with others is like in a game that you can be reasonably guaranteed to have enough people to play with judging from the number of people enjoying it while you are betaing? It is the fun, camaraderie , busy atmosphere , crowd and general energy of a new game.
This is one of the main reasons I always try to start a new game at launch. Even when the game has quite bad bugs this is an important time frame in a game which you can never ever get back. Over time I have started City of Heroes, Everquest 2, WoW, FFXI when it launched in the States , Age of Conan, Dark Age of Camelot, Anarchy Online , Aion ,Vanguard and a few others I am sure missing from this list. Inevitably something made me leave these games but after coming back to them with the passage of time even when they have improved you cannot recapture that initial launch vibe. That is an important place to be in because in my opinion whatever fun there is to be had a lot of the initial excitement and expectations are highest when they launch. You cannot recreate that buzz.
I suppose Rift does not really offer anything new but what it offers me is a chance to partake in that initial excitement of a game that could be big. I am not talking about the aspirations of some Indy game those do not garner that much of an audience I am talking about games that because of their clone status has its own following. It is not really written somewhere that you cannot enjoy clones or even games that do not bring anything new but merely copy things so well from an amalgam of games. That is not a problem I think here. What we have is that many people are fed up with the lack of creativity and their inability to accept what is currently being offered. Add that to them taking offense that others are trying to laud the games they consider cheap knock offs. So they come here and attempt to pee on our collective bowl of cheerios.
In a way I am a little glad that I have not yet lost the love for this genre or try so hard to look for innovation I am happy to enjoy the initial rush. Will I leave ? Perhaps but in the interim I am not going to over analyse any game I happen to like and chip away at the game and get unhappy in the process. I look forward to adventuring with my fellow lovers of this genre and I hope for some good time together even if it is for 3 months.
The more I hear about the soul system the more I think of EQ AA's just done in a different way, as to the public quests it is getting done to death in most the new games that have just come out and are coming out. As to multi classing, that just tends to lead to broken builds in a game. When I was going to download Rift's beta client my best friend told me he had quit the beta to go back to EQ, bad graphics, dated play style, and all. So instead I am waiting until a month after launch of the game to make any decision on playing it. I just felt that the running around screaming omg it is awsome way better than everything else was a bit much. So far it has taken game play mechanics of other games that required active gm participation and automated it. It has taken the talent trees of other games, converged it with EQ's AA system to make something newer and admitedly cooler, and lastly it has worked on making public quests better. Until luanch we won't know how well the game will do. Stamping your foot over and over and shouting rift is awsome everyone else shut up is just counter productive. Enjoy your game, sign up to the beta, and chill out.
You are not going to find one till swtor or gw2 releases.You may play dcuo and have great fun for a while but thats it.It's not going to keep you more than a month entertained
"The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners." - Thomas B. Macaulay
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel J. Boorstin
Rfit is a good game. My only complain is that the movement speed has to be faster! I am not asking for another DCUO super hero speed, but at least not like what I played so far in beta. Is too slow....
If they fix it, then .... I'll be buying this game for sure!!
(I am buying it anyway lol)
League of legends
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Shall i continue or are you happy playing a clone? shit even warhammer is better than rift and rift is a copy of warhammer!
Problem with most people here is they are looking for their first mmo fix that they will never find, some ppl are trying to sell DAoC 2 like that will ever happen, cause obviously that was their first MMO and they really want the feeling they had on those outdated games and because they dont get it they will scream and shout.
Well it aint gonna happen no matter how hard you try, even going back to these games you realize how flawed and broken they were and its true, DAoC, Vanila WoW, UO, T4C, Lineage, Lineage 2, they were fun but were broken games that didnt keep up with the times and after they are gone ppl can only look at them through rose coloured glasses, trying to chase that first mmo fix by thinking that somehow DAoC 2 will fix it, you will be thoroughly disappointed if they ever make a sequel of that.
Back on topic, Rift is a polished game, it is as good as Aion was, honestly it is up there, one thing it has over Aion is it wasnt built for the eastern market, some ppl just cant stand that I personally I am ok the way they play their games but in the west its hard for the general population to accept some of the ways they play.
Beta was fun, it offers a new setting of MMO with some added features and a new design, which tbh has been the norm on all MMO's that have come out, now personally I am interested not only in combat and quests and next gen but in everything as a whole, and rift will fill that game in the meantime the sum of the parts does create a good MMO.
I played the beta this week and am very tempted to buy. I have only one problem with it. If you don't get in game in the first wave of sales, how will the game fair with diminished group numbers closing rifts, as players move on. It was great for a week but how will it fair 3 months after release?
I was lucky enough to log in around 4am two days ago on a low pop pvp shard. I was in the 9-20 defiant freemarch zone and every rift that popped started off soloable. As more can to help the phases of the rift would add more and more mobs as if it scaled to te amount of people contributing to each stage. The amount of rifts spawning were less. About one every few minutes and invasions were also easily taken care of with my lone cleric. All in all with a mix of questing and rifts the whole three hour experience went smoothly. I did have a fog of war bug on my big screen map but I believe I timed rift spawns at 10 per-hour with extremely low activity which is wonderful.Playing: Rift, LotRO
Waiting on: GW2, BP
All content is supposed to scale, for population in a given area...How well this works....I have been able to solo a rift/invasion before, but their have been times when something spawned, people left to go somewhere else, and it spawned for the higher number of people....then you get it turning into a foothold/invasion and you can't solo it, but you can pick off some mobs and probably get help to close them.
Only time will tell, but the mechanic is in place to account for it, consistant execution is the part that remains to be seen.
I was trying Earthrise out too, but the zones crashed like every 3 minutes, was a little fustrating for a game that is I think 2 days from a head start launch and less than a week from regular launch....Still gonna try to tough the crashing out to get a look at it. I like complex crafting and sandbox games.
Also all these people complaining abouyt clones, i sure hope your young and never pc gamed in the 90s, calls thats pretty much all there was.
Apparently stating the truth in my sig is "trolling"
Sig typo fixed thanks to an observant stragen001.
I remember when it was all feilds;)
Seriously though. People expect more now nowadays. You are right though. Games where pretty much the same when I was a lad, playing on my Amstrad cpc 464. I think we forget this is a genre of games. It's like platform games back in the 90's. When you bought one you knew what you where going to get. Despite how many new and inovative features it had on the back of the box. They all played pretty much the same and took the best features of whatever was the top seller at the time. Mmorpg's or all other types of games are no diferent. If people see them all as clones maybe they don't like the respective genre as much as they think they do.
I just got done playing Rift's latest beta event and I will admit that this game isn't bad. As a matter of fact it is pretty good. I only got to level 18 or so, mostly soloing to get an idea of what the game is without zooming through and only did one PvP event which worked out pretty good and was a lot of fun.
My personal accessments is that the game really is what WoW could be if they had enough respect for their player base to actually update the game instead of just expanding it. Both games have almost identical UI's so I have to assume they are using either the same game engine or very similar ones. Here is my personal Pros and Cons for it:
Pros: good animations, good art style (not my personal preference but still good), very good graphics, dynamic rift events, and an interesting class system.
Cons: same yes/no to quests so very little real choice, too frequent rift events, poor quality character customization (including the choice of races and body styles to play), and a crafting system that does not make sense for the game.
Let's face it, there is very few times in our ordinary lives that we only have yes or no choices, so seeing this as the only choices in a game gets a little tedious. Is it too much to ask to add a bit of depth to the questing system by making more than two choices?
While the rift events were very dynamic, they also were so frequent that it got a little annoying just trying to travel between quests. Often there is a fine line between enough and too much of a good thing, but I personally think the developers totally disregarded that line and just decided to pack as many in there as possible and thereby are reducing the effectiveness of this feature of the game.
The character customization bothered me because I purposely went with a look I figured very few other people would go with, but the choices were so limited that I saw three other toons that looked EXACTLY like me in the first twenty minutes of play time. I will admit to being spoiled by the extraordinary character customization of "City of Heroes" though.
That crafting system is what bothers me the most about the game I think. I will grant the developers that if there was no crafting system, people would scream bloody murder over it, but it just does not make sense. Why would souls specifically resurrected by the Gods, to save the world, be interested in crafting? That is where the story and the game mechanics for me just do not mesh well.
The voice work introducing the game was very poorly done in my opinion. I did not list it as a Con though because the rest of the voice work was good and the beginning sequence will only be viewed by people once or twice at the most.
Overall, it is a good game that needs more polishing before it will be considered better than good by me. Still, I would be more much comfortable suggesting Rift to friends interested in trying a new game than WoW. Having played WoW for a while now, I just see Rift as a much better alternative.
"If half of what you tell me is a lie, how can I believe any of it?"
Why don't you spend more time playing Rift and less time on this website worrying about what other people think about the game?
Can't play rift right now the event is over smart guy.
Why do you think i want them to point me to this imaginary game thats better than rift and offers the same features...
Playing: Rift, LotRO
Waiting on: GW2, BP
I was reading this thread at work and it made me wonder. Rift is a good game in it's own right. It does what it does correctly, but don't go beyond.
Was really hyped after the 3rd beta test, i pre-ordered it. Fourth beta test, my enthusiasm went down, I don't know what it was, I spent a lot of time trying to figure it out, but still had some fun. On the fifth beta test, played one day then I found myself re-installing and playing Final Fantasy XIV.
The rifts and invasion are nothing spectacular for me. Wasn't I defending Al Zhabi from beastmen invasions in 2006? Those beastmen would capture npcs and we would have to go fetch them back if we didn't defend the town properly. While I was playing more and more, I would find rifts to be a nuisance, I would not even want to participate in them. It's all a zerg to kill mobs. In events, at least in the 4th beta, no need to group up to get xp and loot. Overall it was just disturbing the very linear questing. At least in WoW, you could go to another zone to level if you wished it.
Now lets see the Ascended Class System. While at first I found it amazing, I now question it. A lot of the "talents" overlapse, all the attacks do similar damage aside from being a different element type. To me it now feels like lets take AoE healing make it one soul, HoT healing make it one soul. Honestly in other games, it would have been grouped together and less redundant. It is good to change role on the fly. But still, in FFXI I had 20 jobs offered to me, but we had to level them all to gain some benefits for our sub job. Even in FFXIV, you can level all your jobs and mix and match abilities you want. So the ACS is not another strong point for me.
But the worst for me is Rift is another solo fest game, where it will be hard to make a good connection and friendship just like in WoW. While you may say public grouping will make groups, yes they will, but will you have time while in them to really get to know your fellow players? Heck Rift gave me the taste to start FFXI all over again.
You've been drinking the kool-aid lately Rock, just because Rift might be better than anything else from your perspective being at the top of a hill of bad doesn't make the game good, at least in many foiks eyes.
The game they want may not exist, doesn't mean they'll accept what Rift has to offer, they'll actually just chose to not play for now. (and of course, complain bitterly on these forums)
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Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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Ok, sure they have taken a lot of stuff from the mighty cartoon game WoW. They have also taken stuff from other games. Thats how it works. You take the good parts that people like.
I don't see anything wrong with that. You see same thing happen with other products like phones, cars, TV etc. What you don't see is people going "ohh a Volvo clone!!! omfg!!!"...
BUT, what they could do in Rift is try make it look more different. I mean for example in WoW you have the dots around the NPC's avatar where you build up your attack.... same in Rift... why not just change the design on that? It can be same function but why must they make it look the same?
Rift is a new game, so why not make a new look on the UI? Do they need to use grey color like WoW and other games? No, but they do. HP bars look the same etc.
Here they could have made the game look so much different. Trick the people that it's not a WoW clone...
Why not take the HP bar from Dead Space or something? Or something close to that. Something that look new!
Rift is not a bad game, but they need to change the design on stuff.
Kyleran this is like the EVE forums all over again. People bashing a game that hardly got out of the tutorial.
Similar to EVE, Rift does not come into its own until 10-15 levels in. Before that your stuck with one spec that looks exactly like WoWs system, doing basic quests designed for non-mmo gamers in a small cramped zone.
They log off after they see that and then write entire 1000+ word reviews as if they played the game since Beta1.
Its just like the EVE forums and I wouldnt stand it then and I wont stand for it now.
Playing: Rift, LotRO
Waiting on: GW2, BP
You know I am going to have to chime in, because to much BS is being slung around. First off does Rift's quest do it better than say WoW's quest? You say no. I say yes. Why do I say yes. Simple answer. If I have to go get 5 crystal shards from Fae Faeries in Rift - I kill five - I get five shards in Rift. In WoW I need 5 talons from purple drakes. I need to kill upwards of 30 drakes and I will finally get the drops I need to get my 5 talons. That is the difference. One is a tedious time-sink - the other isn't.