What's this all about?

FaithfulLoki · May 2007

I've never heard anything about this game. What kind of storyline does it have and what's the gameplay like?

agh50 · May 2007

It was released last summer. It had one of the worst releases in MMORPG history. The game was full of bugs and was very unstable. In addition only about 40% of the content that was advertised was included. Add to that a very unresponsive design staff, questionable billing practices, and a proprietary dispute over the basic game engine, and it was utter chaos.

It had a popular predessessor called Settlers of Ganareth and many of the players of that game were given promises of a number of 'goodies' in the new game if they would sign on. Few of those promises were kept, and the supposed 'new and improved' SoG was a complete failure.

The bitterness that all these shananigins engendered is rivalled only by the pre-NGE SWG players, (as a cursory reading of these boards will show).

Since then the company has made some improvements in the game, and I found it is ok for the first 25 levels or so in the starting areas. However once a player moves out of those areas, many of the same problems are still present.

The worst problem with the game itself is with performance which is not good, even on good rigs. FPS seems to top-out in the mid teens, and can be as low as 5-6 fps in some situations. There are too many desktop crashes, downloading, patching, and log-in issues. Other, less game-breaking bugs still exist as well.

In game content may have risen to 50% over the 40% of last summer; an improvement, but only slightly.

Even though it is free to play, the player base is still quite small. I would 'guestimate' that even during peak playing hours you would be hard pressed to find 75-100 players throughout both Kingdoms. Usually half that number.

The world is huge. It is one of it's strong points, but take a server population of 75 and put it into a world that is 5-6 tiems the size of EQ2 say, or 2-3 times the size of Vanguard, and you have a very lonely world. It is however well populated with MOBs now of the right levels in the right spots. (it wasn't last summer, where you might find aggro MOBS 20 levels above you right on the newbie areas and bind spots)

The game was envisioned to be a massive PvP player-run world with many of the so-called 3rd generation MMO features. Right now it is far from that vision, and due to the just-announced copywrite lawsuit by the designer of the original graphics engine, it's future is shakey at best.

SnailGames is releasing it in China, and may bring some much needed resources, but this is never going to be a front line MMORPG.

I played from release last summer, and quit after three months due to the afore mentioned problems. I came back recently when they made it free to play, and saw a little progress.

However they are still easily a year, (or more), away from having the game anywhere near what they promised it would be last summer. By that time the character models, animations, UI, etc. will be hopelessly out of date.

I rated it about a 3.8 on the poll here.

But it is free for now, and I would say try it--if for no other reason than to experience how really massive the world is, and to see for yourself what all the 'Sturm und Drang' is about.

Leodious · May 2007

Originally posted by agh50
It was released last summer. It had one of the worst releases in MMORPG history. The game was full of bugs and was very unstable. In addition only about 40% of the content that was advertised was included. Add to that a very unresponsive design staff, questionable billing practices, and a proprietary dispute over the basic game engine, and it was utter chaos.
It had a popular predessessor called Settlers of Ganareth and many of the players of that game were given promises of a number of 'goodies' in the new game if they would sign on. Few of those promises were kept, and the supposed 'new and improved' SoG was a complete failure.
The bitterness that all these shananigins engendered is rivalled only by the pre-NGE SWG players, (as a cursory reading of these boards will show).
Since then the company has made some improvements in the game, and I found it is ok for the first 25 levels or so in the starting areas. However once a player moves out of those areas, many of the same problems are still present.
The worst problem with the game itself is with performance which is not good, even on good rigs. FPS seems to top-out in the mid teens, and can be as low as 5-6 fps in some situations. There are too many desktop crashes, downloading, patching, and log-in issues. Other, less game-breaking bugs still exist as well.
In game content may have risen to 50% over the 40% of last summer; an improvement, but only slightly.
Even though it is free to play, the player base is still quite small. I would 'guestimate' that even during peak playing hours you would be hard pressed to find 75-100 players throughout both Kingdoms. Usually half that number.
The world is huge. It is one of it's strong points, but take a server population of 75 and put it into a world that is 5-6 tiems the size of EQ2 say, or 2-3 times the size of Vanguard, and you have a very lonely world. It is however well populated with MOBs now of the right levels in the right spots. (it wasn't last summer, where you might find aggro MOBS 20 levels above you right on the newbie areas and bind spots)
The game was envisioned to be a massive PvP player-run world with many of the so-called 3rd generation MMO features. Right now it is far from that vision, and due to the just-announced copywrite lawsuit by the designer of the original graphics engine, it's future is shakey at best.
SnailGames is releasing it in China, and may bring some much needed resources, but this is never going to be a front line MMORPG.
I played from release last summer, and quit after three months due to the afore mentioned problems. I came back recently when they made it free to play, and saw a little progress.
However they are still easily a year, (or more), away from having the game anywhere near what they promised it would be last summer. By that time the character models, animations, UI, etc. will be hopelessly out of date.
I rated it about a 3.8 on the poll here.
But it is free for now, and I would say try it--if for no other reason than to experience how really massive the world is, and to see for yourself what all the 'Sturm und Drang' is about.

Most of this is true, but SoG was sort of like the beta; and it wasn't popular at all. IT was the first chance people had to play the game itself, and it was so bad that no one wanted to play the full version of the game at release. Many people (including myslef* were excited about it, but when we played it, we realized how terrible it was.

Daedalus732 · May 2007

Lets not forget how the company who made the DnL scammed their customers, forcing many people to call their credit card companies and have them block payment to the company.

I wouldn't give this game the time of day.

jimmyman99 · September 2007

Originally posted by agh50

It was released last summer. It had one of the worst releases in MMORPG history. The game was full of bugs and was very unstable. In addition only about 40% of the content that was advertised was included. Add to that a very unresponsive design staff, questionable billing practices, and a proprietary dispute over the basic game engine, and it was utter chaos.
It had a popular predessessor called Settlers of Ganareth and many of the players of that game were given promises of a number of 'goodies' in the new game if they would sign on. Few of those promises were kept, and the supposed 'new and improved' SoG was a complete failure.
The bitterness that all these shananigins engendered is rivalled only by the pre-NGE SWG players, (as a cursory reading of these boards will show).
Since then the company has made some improvements in the game, and I found it is ok for the first 25 levels or so in the starting areas. However once a player moves out of those areas, many of the same problems are still present.
The worst problem with the game itself is with performance which is not good, even on good rigs. FPS seems to top-out in the mid teens, and can be as low as 5-6 fps in some situations. There are too many desktop crashes, downloading, patching, and log-in issues. Other, less game-breaking bugs still exist as well.
In game content may have risen to 50% over the 40% of last summer; an improvement, but only slightly.
Even though it is free to play, the player base is still quite small. I would 'guestimate' that even during peak playing hours you would be hard pressed to find 75-100 players throughout both Kingdoms. Usually half that number.
The world is huge. It is one of it's strong points, but take a server population of 75 and put it into a world that is 5-6 tiems the size of EQ2 say, or 2-3 times the size of Vanguard, and you have a very lonely world. It is however well populated with MOBs now of the right levels in the right spots. (it wasn't last summer, where you might find aggro MOBS 20 levels above you right on the newbie areas and bind spots)
The game was envisioned to be a massive PvP player-run world with many of the so-called 3rd generation MMO features. Right now it is far from that vision, and due to the just-announced copywrite lawsuit by the designer of the original graphics engine, it's future is shakey at best.
SnailGames is releasing it in China, and may bring some much needed resources, but this is never going to be a front line MMORPG.
I played from release last summer, and quit after three months due to the afore mentioned problems. I came back recently when they made it free to play, and saw a little progress.
However they are still easily a year, (or more), away from having the game anywhere near what they promised it would be last summer. By that time the character models, animations, UI, etc. will be hopelessly out of date.
I rated it about a 3.8 on the poll here.
But it is free for now, and I would say try it--if for no other reason than to experience how really massive the world is, and to see for yourself what all the 'Sturm und Drang' is about.

Maaan, I read your posts and you have style. Are you a writer or a reporter by any chance? Your articles are well designed and articulate, AND, which is even more important, arent biased and are very objective.

Zorvan · September 2007

Originally posted by Leodious

Originally posted by agh50

It was released last summer. It had one of the worst releases in MMORPG history. The game was full of bugs and was very unstable. In addition only about 40% of the content that was advertised was included. Add to that a very unresponsive design staff, questionable billing practices, and a proprietary dispute over the basic game engine, and it was utter chaos.

It had a popular predessessor called Settlers of Ganareth and many of the players of that game were given promises of a number of 'goodies' in the new game if they would sign on. Few of those promises were kept, and the supposed 'new and improved' SoG was a complete failure.

The bitterness that all these shananigins engendered is rivalled only by the pre-NGE SWG players, (as a cursory reading of these boards will show).

Since then the company has made some improvements in the game, and I found it is ok for the first 25 levels or so in the starting areas. However once a player moves out of those areas, many of the same problems are still present.

The worst problem with the game itself is with performance which is not good, even on good rigs. FPS seems to top-out in the mid teens, and can be as low as 5-6 fps in some situations. There are too many desktop crashes, downloading, patching, and log-in issues. Other, less game-breaking bugs still exist as well.

In game content may have risen to 50% over the 40% of last summer; an improvement, but only slightly.

Even though it is free to play, the player base is still quite small. I would 'guestimate' that even during peak playing hours you would be hard pressed to find 75-100 players throughout both Kingdoms. Usually half that number.

The world is huge. It is one of it's strong points, but take a server population of 75 and put it into a world that is 5-6 tiems the size of EQ2 say, or 2-3 times the size of Vanguard, and you have a very lonely world. It is however well populated with MOBs now of the right levels in the right spots. (it wasn't last summer, where you might find aggro MOBS 20 levels above you right on the newbie areas and bind spots)

The game was envisioned to be a massive PvP player-run world with many of the so-called 3rd generation MMO features. Right now it is far from that vision, and due to the just-announced copywrite lawsuit by the designer of the original graphics engine, it's future is shakey at best.

SnailGames is releasing it in China, and may bring some much needed resources, but this is never going to be a front line MMORPG.

I played from release last summer, and quit after three months due to the afore mentioned problems. I came back recently when they made it free to play, and saw a little progress.

However they are still easily a year, (or more), away from having the game anywhere near what they promised it would be last summer. By that time the character models, animations, UI, etc. will be hopelessly out of date.

I rated it about a 3.8 on the poll here.

But it is free for now, and I would say try it--if for no other reason than to experience how really massive the world is, and to see for yourself what all the 'Sturm und Drang' is about.

Most of this is true, but SoG was sort of like the beta; and it wasn't popular at all. IT was the first chance people had to play the game itself, and it was so bad that no one wanted to play the full version of the game at release. Many people (including myslef* were excited about it, but when we played it, we realized how terrible it was.

Yep, Settlers of Ganareth was the portion of the game intended to be a free preview of things to come for pre-orders ( or Pioneer accounts, as they were called), and was simply supposed to be a prelude to the real game. When it turned out to BE the real game, that started the landslide that is DnL.

bopice · October 2007

It's a good game , i personally enjoyed EQ1 more. Just for the Pve and tradeskills. Wow is ok too just didn't have enough content for me.

Listof · October 2007

I think you guys are painting SOG in too nice of a light, if possible.

DnL (the full version) was supposed to be released in the fall of... geez, what year was that, 2005? I think? Of course, most games are postponed during development - and DnL was - several times. But this was different, they had given everyone a firm release month for DnL. They promised that it would be released during a certain month and not postponed the way it had in the past. First day of the month came - no concrete date from the devs. Halfway through the month - nothing. But this whole time, they are still insisting that it will be released. Finally near the end of the month they say "Oh, we're not going to release after all."

And then, on top of breaking their promise they suddenly announced SOG, which they had never even hinted at before - in other words, it was not their original plan. IMO, the game had a LONG way to go but they didn't have the money to keep it in development any longer, so they HAD to do something. Hence, they came up with the whole SOG/pre-order idea.

It's been a few years and my memory is a little fuzzy - but I want to make it perfectly clear that this was not just another case of a game being delayed and/or released too early. The devs actually lied to their potential customers on numerous occasions, broke promises they had made, etc. This was happening long before the whole SOG/preorder issue came up. Why anyone even trusted them enough to give them money for a preorder is beyond me. After the whole fiasco in the fall where they promised they would be releasing the game and even on into the month were promising that it would be released, I realized that they could not be trusted. If a company lies to you and breaks their promises, why would you give them money?

Sucks cuz I think they had some great concepts, but the game never has and never will live up to its potential. Even if they did miraculously get all the content into the game, they'll never be able to get enough customers playing it to make it a worthy experience.

Unknown · October 2007

Just as a fun bit of trivia, the original SoG was basically a pre-order beta. It had a lot of hype and excitement, so many people were pumped up to get in on the pre-order. The first round had 10,000 copies, and I was online the moment the pre-order went live. However, I kept getting a page can't be displayed error, and the server essentially crumbled due to the load. The pre-order was sold out three minutes later, and I didn't get a copy. It didn't matter though. The game was dead a week later...

ram3o · October 2007

Just as a fun bit of trivia, the original SoG was basically a pre-order beta. It had a lot of hype and excitement, so many people were pumped up to get in on the pre-order. The first round had 10,000 copies, and I was online the moment the pre-order went live. However, I kept getting a page can't be displayed error, and the server essentially crumbled due to the load. The pre-order was sold out three minutes later, and I didn't get a copy. It didn't matter though. The game was dead a week later...

Yeah I remember not getting a copy in thoes three minutes. So I had to go to ebay and buy one for $1000. Good thing it free2play now.

Listof · October 2007

Originally posted by ram3o

Just as a fun bit of trivia, the original SoG was basically a pre-order beta. It had a lot of hype and excitement, so many people were pumped up to get in on the pre-order. The first round had 10,000 copies, and I was online the moment the pre-order went live. However, I kept getting a page can't be displayed error, and the server essentially crumbled due to the load. The pre-order was sold out three minutes later, and I didn't get a copy. It didn't matter though. The game was dead a week later...

Yeah I remember not getting a copy in thoes three minutes. So I had to go to ebay and buy one for $1000. Good thing it free2play now.

Wow... just... wow... How can someone be so desperate to play a game that's not even come out of NDA that they would pay 1k for it? x.X

Money well spent, IMO.

ROFL

Speiberbob · October 2007

*buzzzzzzes ram3o witha buzzer pistol*

nut yes..i was one of the fools with a settler preorder..lanscape almost as big as swiss.

..oh the promises have been so good...and flying was fun ^^

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