Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
What LOTRO is... (and is NOT.)
Superman0X
Member RarePosts: 2,292
There seems to be a lot of confusion about what LOTRO is, and is not. Having played both in closed (and now open) beta, let me express what I feel to be a realistic concept of the game.
LOTRO is NOT an innovative, ground breaking game, that is going to change the face of the MMO industry.
However, it is a game that attempts to take a lot of ideas for other games, and mold them around the LOTR world. If you dont like the games that it takes ideas from... you are not going to like this game either.
This is a game about CONTENT (not killing, PVP, or crafting). This is very similar to WoW or EQ2. If you like doing quests, and following storylines, then you may enjoy this game.
This is NOT a sandbox game. There may be a lot of options... but you really cant just do what you want (unless you want to follow the storyline/quests).
This game has PMvP. This is a refinement of RvR (like WoW or DAOC). It allows players to compete against each other in a very limited way... but removes all PVP class balance issues.
This game does NOT have open PVP. It is 100% PVE. Letting players play monsters, allows for PMVP... and some challenge for high level players.... but it is still PVE (with players as the monsters).
This game does NOT have a Player/Crafter based economy. Drops are good. Crafting is better, Quests are the best. In the long run, nothing a player makes will be as good as the quest/raid drops.
This game does have useful crafting. It is simple, and easy to use (Similar to WoW or EQ2). It fills a middle role between common drops, and quest/raid items. It has some useful buff (food) items, and some cool (tobacco) items. It fills a fun nich, but it is not the focus of the game.
The graphics of this game are NOT cutting edge. They are blocky, and with the low res client, look similar to many other games out there.
The high res client makes a HUGE difference for textures. Things may still be a bit blocky, but with high res textures, they look great.
The bottom line about this game is that it is not ground breaking. It is more of the same. It is about CONTENT. People who like to experience the story, and be involved in quests will find hat this game provides a lot of entertainment. People who dont like that... well this game is not for you. The graphics are not the best out there... but they are nothing to laugh at. This game take a lot of ideas (good or bad) from other games, and puts them all together in a very tidy package. There are several areas of innovation.... but the honest truth is that if you dont like PVE, quest based games (like WoW)... then you wont like this.
This is a great game for some people, and not so great for others. Please do not get upset if it is not the type of game you like, but dont put others down for liking it... because it is the type that they like. People seem to be getting upset about how this game does not meet thier requirements... well they shouldnt be. This game is good at what it does...
Comments
It's like they took ideas from all the games out there currently, had a list of the things people hated about them, and fixed/tried fixing the majority, but added nothing truly new...
I'm fine with it till the next "best" thing.
Yes this game has a decent amount of content, would I say an unusually large amount? No.
Yes it's very easy to get into and has a very slight, learning curve which is good for new players or even new to MMO-playres.
Actually, I would have to say that as a seasoned MMO player... this game is a bit on the Too Easy side of the market.
Yes the game is about content but how far can that content go, when players can max out in a month or two (via that content), the quests are not shabby, some are quite nice and many things in the game are decently thought out but I know Turbine can do a heck of allot better.
I personally think they are going to have to put allot more effort into the game (including content) before launch, it's far too easy to reach end game, which shortens the long term playability of a game. The crafting system is lackluster at best so if you like to make things, this game is not for you. I am not mad about what this game has become. I am a bit thrown aback by the fact that seemingly so little effort was really put into it. Even with it's decent (though still sub-par) amount of content and story base, there is far too little in the game of all the things which are pretty much industry standards as of circa 1999-2004.
I will admit that in the very beginning this game has the potential to have allot of "Wow" (Not WoW) factor, but that fades soon after you realize that about the only thing the game has going for it is the story base.
Rock solid for a beta, as far as bugs and glitches though, very very few games hit beta stage with so few problems. Kudos to them for that. I wish them luck with it, I enjoyed having input in the games beta stages but... I've played far too many and personally expect far more from a game.
LOTRO just takes the ideas of quest based MMO , fuses them together in most enjoyable way.
It is not ground breaking , neither is MMO to answer all the MMO fans.
But if you like story , great atmosphere, detailed world, great NPCs , questing and PVE - LOTRO is a GEM
...
If you hate it, well ok. Go on. Nobody is twisting your arm to play it
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
Good luck finding a game that captures you. Frankly, after my poor experience with VG, I'm done 'waiting for the next MMO." People could spend their whole lives waiting for something that will never arrive. I've settled on LOTRO because it does a lot of things right. Not perfect, but it's solid and does have a lot of content (over 1500 quests.) Beside WoW, I don't know of any game that has that much content, especially at launch!
To the OP. Great review. Quite accurate. There are two points with which I differ in opinion.
First, the sandbox element. It is not as expansive in this regard as say EvE or SWG-NGE, but there certainly are sandbox elements. Music is one such element. There are a nice range of emotes, along with animated pipe smoking and beer drinking for those roleplaying moments. You can also adventure out to the many forts and fight (ie grind) mobs for xp and loot (I've done this, so no one can tell me they can't). Turbine wants to add more sandbox elements like housing and knship buildings, and more functionality for their current music system.
To some, sandbox means a FFA gank game with full loot. To these people, it is either all or nothing. LOTRO is a story-driven game but with sandbox elements.
The second point addresses your statement about quest items being the most powerful. This is also not quite accurate. The devs have stated, and crafters have confirmed that the most powerful items are made by master crafters using a component dropped as loot. At mid levels I often found myself bidding at the auction house for crafted weapons because the quest or loot drops weren't keeping pace. More often than not, I would be outbid on these items too! So someone please tell these other customers that quest and loot drops are better so I can get the crafted items I need.
Other than those two points, I think your review is quite spot on.
_____________________________
Currently Playing: LOTRO; DDO
Played: AC2, AO, Auto Assault, CoX, DAoC, DDO, Earth&Beyond, EQ1, EQ2, EVE, Fallen Earth, Jumpgate, Roma Victor, Second Life, SWG, V:SoH, WoW, World War II Online.
Games I'm watching: Infinity: The Quest for Earth, Force of Arms.
Find the Truth: http://www.factcheck.org/
I'm looking forward to running across the plains of Rohan and standing atop Minas Tirath overlooking Mordor years from now. I'm expecting LotRO to have a steady stream of fresh and exciting content for years to come.
The most important part of reading is reading between the lines.
Not only that, but Turbine will be filling in the corners of Tolkien's world, places only mentioned once or twice, or places only hinted at on the maps.
HOnestly, that is the main reason I'm sticking with LOTRO. To see how it all turns out.
_____________________________
Currently Playing: LOTRO; DDO
Played: AC2, AO, Auto Assault, CoX, DAoC, DDO, Earth&Beyond, EQ1, EQ2, EVE, Fallen Earth, Jumpgate, Roma Victor, Second Life, SWG, V:SoH, WoW, World War II Online.
Games I'm watching: Infinity: The Quest for Earth, Force of Arms.
Find the Truth: http://www.factcheck.org/
It will be a game that is not for everyone, that is for sure.
So far I've loved it and my wife, brother, and I all have pre-orders because we do enjoy the layout as is for this game.
*WoW is faster paced, hands down -- faster leveling, faster combat, faster overall -- it makes the gameplay feel different
*WoW is *not* a "quests only* game, it is also a grinding game. I would say WoW is a quests + grinding game, and certainly at the end of the game there is a ton of grinding to do. Not so in LOTRO. LOTRO really doesn't reward many XPs at all for grinding mobs, and the only reason you would grind mobs is to farm mats. In WoW people grind mobs because they don't want to "waste time" running around to get and complete quests when it is "more efficient" to cut out the travel time, stay in one place, and grind. Again, as a result the gameplay feels different from WoW.
*WoW is not nearly as storyline driven or as linear as LOTRO. LOTRO's instanced storyline quests follow a more or less straight line. WoW has story arcs too, but they overlap and after a while you are flitting back and forth between so many zones, the story arcs get blurred or lost altogether --> part of WoW's design is to keep you on the move between different settings to maintain interest and pacing, whereas in LOTR, the focus is on the linear storyline and more or less everything fits together somehow.
*LOTRO is not nearly as item-centric as WoW is, not by a longshot. WoW is all about your character's stats and finding or buying items that improve these stats, even from an early level. in LOTR, this is not really the emphasis at all ... armor only has minor mitigating value, there are items with nice performance bonuses, but nothing at all like the stat bonus stockpiling campaign that WoW essentially is. Again, this makes for a different game.
I've played WoW on and off for 2+ years and I like the game, so this is not a bashing of WoW post at all. But after playing LOTRO for a while I really see these "like WoW" comparisons to be pretty superficial, and to be overlooking some of the more substantive differences between the game experience of the two games, all of which have an impact on the feeling of playing the respective games.
"This game is good at what it does" - Truer words could not have been spoken.
It does not do what some people were hoping or expecting it to...hence they don't care for it... but for many people it will be a fun game to play. Sure, the hardcore may blow through the content in a month or two... but.. the game wasn't designed for them. It's focus is on the more casual game player who enjoys fun over grind....
And you will do some grinding...just try and level up Scholar talents with grinding for hours on getting the cracked urns you need to skill up. But the exp you get is negligible.
And the Monster Play Pvp will probably turn out to be some fun..but we'll have to wait until we get some actual players up to 40+ so we can find out for sure.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
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
Thats intuitively right and perfect for a Middle-Earth Setting during the War of the Ring. As the ring goes farther south the expansions can very well be added in chronological order. I even bet Turbine has exactly this in mind, once planned as MEO - large scale whole Middle Earth in one game - they shrinked the concept to qualitiy>size and add more content over time.
This game is the first game I remember that does not start with a confined world to wich the devs artificially add new areas out of doubtful reasons (like in SWG, in WoW, in EQ2, you name it). No, in this game they start whole-heartedly with only a fraction of the total world, knowing that there is time and space to add more while still making Eriador a hot spot of the "one Ring" myth with including Angmar and the lost Realm. That is truly unique.
Eriador is THE perfect startup setting as it IS a wilderness, a ruined land of the once great northern kingdom of men while still having havens of civilisation like Bree/Imladris...
...again: This game so much screams the line "MUCH MORE TO COME..." I have a hard time believing someone can ignore it.
Meridion
Three thumbs up for your refinement of the OP's review. I have also settled on LOTRO to be me main game while nothing is even nearly as much fun right now.
The only other thing is that I think the game is pretty damn gorgeous in most regards. Some of the character models could use some higher quality skinning, but otherwise it certainly exceeds the current crop of MMO's, IMHO.
--
psyconius Cthulhu
Gothika Studios
Good post about what is and what is not LOTRO
All canceled. Waiting on Warhammer Online : Age of Reckoning.
PvM is 2 players fighting against eachother so that way it's PvP.
It feels like PvP.
It plays like PvP.
It is PvP.
It's just like DAOC's battlegrounds without siege engines.
You play with a character and fight against other players.
That's PvP no matter how you twist and turn it.
Period.
And for the last time.
"PvE - player versus environment"
Definition: Player versus environment is used to describe the type of gameplay where people compete against the computer or computer-driven opponents.___________________________________________
I would agree with most of what you say.
1. I do believe the graphics are within the top 5 mmorpgs out there, which is saying alot for the amount of mmo's that flood the market.
2.They do have some innovation, the music system is very popular.
3. There is PVP, it is called Dueling, there is a form of Tag out in Bree, there is Monsterplay and the Ettenmoors is definately pvp.
And there are some real limiting factors to this game
1. Limited classes and races
I think they are trying to stay with the lore enough to keep the feel of LoTR, I have enjoyed this game thus far, and find plenty to do still.
Rage - Head Honcho of the Revilers
"Ragemore and Whine Less"
Agree with the OP, seems a fair summary of LOTRO
I would like to add a note from my beta experience (september 2006 - march 2007) regarding the games casual/solo friendliness.
At around level 35 the game becomes much less casual player tolerant and there are far fewer quests that do not require grouping.
Many of the quests that indicate solo content, actually have elites patrolling on top of the objectives or require fighting through elites to get to your destination. The amount of elites in the higher areas is alarming and I can only assume that Turbine are hoping to add content before anyone gets that far. If they don't, expect to have to find groups regularly to reach level 50. (this may have changed as I stopped testing at the beginning of march)
Another note is that the xp gain from quests has been lowered and the game is much harder to solo as group quests may have to be used to fill any gaps in required xp. If you are in a Kinship or have friends to quest with, this should not be a problem.
I agree with your post for the mostpart. However, there is one thing you left out.
The epic storyline ( questline ). The one thing that is new to me ( previously played swg/WoW / eq2 / Vanguard ), is a real story within the game. The epic questline from level 1 to level 50 is a big hook for me ( and many others ) and is something i always wanted to see in an MMO.
-Allegria
Ok I've read the OP review. Very good review, and I've read the responses. Don't bash me, as I've only played LOTRO closed beta, but I want to hear responses in comparison to Vanguard.
First and foremost, we all know Vanguard has bugs, needs polishing, and has performance issues. Let's forget about that for right now and talk graphics and gameplay.
1. Vanguard's graphics seem better than LOTRO? Yes or No, and why?
2. The combat system in Vanguard is better than LOTRO? Not talking about animations, I'm talking about combat. Yes or No, and why?
3. The questing system in both games seem about even, although LOTRO does have a better storyline fitting into the quests? Yes or No, and why?
4. The worlds in Vanguard are much larger than LOTRO (at it's current state). Yes, No, and why?
5. Vanguard's PVP system has it's issues, but is still more open-based than LOTRO with the PMvP system. Opinions?
6. Does LOTRO have the potential of being bigger than Vanguard, raid wise? Both games don't really have any raid content as of yet. Any opinions on this? This is huge for alot of people.
7. Community - Vanguard's numbers are diminishing due to people being frustrated with the state of the game and quitting. However with changes coming in the future, people could come back. As far as LOTRO, it's the Lord of the Ring's NAME that will bring people, but it's more for the casual player than the hardcore gamer so they will get bored in a month and leave. What are your opinions on this?
8. Vanguard's crafting system is light years past LOTRO's. This is huge for alot of playres. What do you think?
9. LOTRO has instanced questing while Vanguard is completely instanced free. This is a biggie for alot of players. Your concerns?
I currently play VG, but I like the LOTR books and movies and have been drawn to playing the game. But in my opinion, the graphics are better in VG, the combat system is better in VG, and there's just more to do in VG regardless if there are bugs, polishing needs, and performance issues.
IMO there needs to be more end-game content and raid content to make a game last for the casual and the hardcore player. There needs to be some longevity or people will get bored and be gone in a month.
I'm just really trying to see what is better in LOTRO versus Vanguard right now. I'm enjoying Vanguard but as we all know, no matter how fun a MMO is for someone, if there's not any players to group with or play with, then whats the point.
Thanks for listening.
At the risk of hijacking a perfectly decent thread, I'll answer the following questions....
_____________________________
Currently Playing: LOTRO; DDO
Played: AC2, AO, Auto Assault, CoX, DAoC, DDO, Earth&Beyond, EQ1, EQ2, EVE, Fallen Earth, Jumpgate, Roma Victor, Second Life, SWG, V:SoH, WoW, World War II Online.
Games I'm watching: Infinity: The Quest for Earth, Force of Arms.
Find the Truth: http://www.factcheck.org/
See you in the dream..
The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
Of course there is more to come because it is based on a pre-written story. We all know ...(if your read the books or even watched the movies) ... what can be added so there is no surprise there.
Though in my opinion the entire game looks nothing like I thought it would during the war.
I played LOTRO from early January in closed beta, through February.
During the closed beta, I was certain that there was no way I was going to play LOTRO. I wasn't going to do it - I appreciated it for what it was, but I had decided it wasn't the right game. So I got Vanguard, which I enjoy when playing with my two friends who also subscribe. However, I ONLY enjoy Vanguard during that time.
I came back to the World Tour of LOTRO, and my mind has been totally changed. I'm on the verge of a pre-order. I spent 5.5 hours today just PLAYING. I found a great fellowship and knocked out some of the epic story quests. I did some crafting (because I'm not a masochist, I much prefer LOTRO's simple-but-effective crafting system, as opposed to Vanguard's I-will-give-you-carpal-tunnel-syndrome crafting system). The animations have improved, and I absolutely adore the music system, being an amateur guitarist IRL. I've already transcribed a couple of songs using my guitar and then translating them onto my minstrel's lute.
I find LOTRO much more fun to just play, which really confuses me, as I was dead-on certain that I was not going to play it. Advice: if you only played during closed beta, go back and take a look at the World Tour. A lot has changed.
--------
"Give a man a fire, and he is warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he is warm for the rest of his life."