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Play-as-they-tell-you
delete5230
Member EpicPosts: 7,081
After about a week of play I figured out the rutine.
This game has a major carrot-on-a-stick game play.
When you leave the Starting area, you will be playing in order from left to right, bottom to top for each zone. 4-5 area, then 6-7 8-9 10-11. At around level 10 you can freely walk around the entire zone and harvest materials. Then you can move to the next zone and repeat 11-12 13-14 15-16 and so on.
To mix things up they give you a mini dungeon for each of the two levels where you can collect weapons incase you don't like to craft. Or at any given time you can dungeon finder a group dungeon.
Play-as-they-tell-you.
Don't feel bad, I noticed starting with Rift, all mmos were made this way.
Comments
I agree with your assessment, however I think you expect it to be a sandbox, and it is not. Im sorry you are disappointed, but your expectations are a little off. I do think you would have more fun playing a sandbox instead of a themepark game. Me personally I didnt mind because in the end it was all about pvp in cyrodiil.
Bonus hint :
Some sub zones ( say 16-17 ) may have more quest than needed to advance. Just press on forward, you can't loose, its all good.
Yes, you went on about this here. I guess you felt you needed to post about it again?
There is a lot of merit in moving on and finding a game that you do enjoy. However, going by your post history, I'm not sure that you are here to talk about positive or constructive topics.
Ah, I got trolled....
Yup
Welcome to Themepark MMOs.
They have been this way for years. You may be new to the MMO genre, or at least the themepark MMO. Thanks for telling us AGAIN how these are. The rest of us figured this out around 10-12 years ago.
There like not even mmos anymore, just games
well, with a dungeon finder, sorry forgot !
Wow, what a new and refreshing topic! And the OP even used the very rare "carrot-on-a-stick" phrase. Although, I am going to have to deduct points for not using the terms, "linear" and "on rails" enough.
Seriously, this subject has never been broached before. Thank you OP for enlightening the masses! Until this thread, I would have never guessed that a themepark game tends to have a guided path for how one levels up.
Yawn.
What I did when leveling my alt was collect the lore books, sky shards, and did dolems in each zone. Each zone has about 10 mini dungeons, atleast one big public dungeon, and a instance. On my main I leveled from 10 to v14 (minus about 10 levels in Cyrodiil.
I keep saying I'm going to make an alt and do all the quests, but... yeah.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
If you are NOT doing the quests in this game, you are completely playing it wrong. I don't usually pull the "you're doing it wrong" card, but there it is.
It's a themepark. It's linear in design. And it's got amazing lore and immersion. Why someone would play this game and not maximize their immersion by doing the well-conceived quest lines is beyond me. Makes no sense.
Your first boss was the credit card boss... it was required to get you attuned to the game... the second boss is the subscription boss... it tests you every 30 days to see if you are still worthy to play the game... everything in game is ruled by these two bosses alone... do not make them angry or they will banish you from their game.
That was my main gripe with ESO. It is a quality game with strange design choices.
It has absolutely zero sandbox elements outside of Cyrodil.
And someone said "you're doing it wrong", I disagree, I think Zenimax "made it wrong" as no Elder Scrolls game is linear.
Hoping the Justice System adds some unique gameplay. They will need to provide reasons to go back into other zones though.... otherwise all the action will be in craglorn and Cyrodil (which is already where it is).
Looking forward to: Crowfall / Lost Ark / Black Desert Mobile
This is how Elder Scrolls Online plays :
Level 6-7
Do quest a,b,c
Level 8-9
Do quest a.b.c
Level 10-11
Do quest a,b,c
Then move to the next zone.
Level 12-13
Do quest a,b,c
Watch the same exact story quest video that everyone else has.
Level 14-15
Do quest a,b,c
This is basically how themepark games work and have done for some time... some of them might give you an option of a few different zones to do at that level but its always a steady progression to end game areas.
If you don't pay attention to the story, or how crafting works, or how the combat system works, or how the class system works, or read the books, or talk to any of the NPCs...
Then, yes, you can break any computer game down into a same-sounding set of mechanical tasks.
You can also break anything else in life down in the same way; what's the point? This is a story-driven game with a strong questing and PvE focus at low levels. It has an unusually long leveling curve for a modern game.
Congratulations you found a pattern in gameplay and quest insertions. Unless you really want to do the quests you are free to explore the zone, gather crafting materials, do the random events in each zone, close the gates and so much more.
OP:
I hate to break it to you, man: underneath it all, there are just 1s and 0s. Sorry to disappoint.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
lol this is great!
Dang! You broke my immersion!
( Goes back to roleplaying with the 1s and 0s )
I do have to say this IS great !..............:)
Good. I'm glad you enjoyed me poking fun at the dissection
ESO is just a themepark. A very good themepark but it follows many of the tried and true formulas that have allowed themeparks to stay at the top of the MMO charts for more than a decade. Very orderly traditionally-constructed zones for leveling is just one of those.
I'm not disregarding the innovations and some of the themepark formulas it decided not to duplicate (lack of an Auction House being the most obvious) and there are many improvements on staple features (outstanding music, much better than average quest stories, gigantic PVP zones, the upcoming PVP dungeon in the Imperial City, etc.) but it is a relatively conservative MMO. This is not really surprising considering that this is not a small indy developer trying to make a name for themselves. Instead of trying to reinvent the wheel, they decided to just make the best conventional wheel they could make.
There are some new and innovative takes on the MMO genre being developed that we'll probably start seeing in the next year or 2 (EQN, Citadel of Sorcery, etc.) and they all seem promising and interesting. But at the moment all they are is interesting possibilities that may or may not turn out to be more fun than what we currently play...time will tell.
So for now, yeah...left to right and/or bottom to top zone leveling is what a lot of MMOs continue to have. Just don't look too closely at it or you'll just spoil your own fun.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Thanks for a good definition of a Theme park. Now that we know that, Elders Scrolls Online is one to the max.
I'm just letting any potential players looking for an mmo to understand this is more of a SCRIPTED STORY THAN AN MMO.
Hay, some people like story driven games, to each there own. But it's not much of an mmo. Its game with a dungeon Finder when players are feeling frisky.......Of cores it also has PvP, I'm not much for a Battle field games. And for those that do, they may find that interesting.