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First 20 levels - initial thoughts.
A little background first - my first MMO was Anarchy Online, played Guildwars, WOW, LOTRO and EVE more extensively, tried most of everything else that came out from the subscription based MMOs.
I'm not a power gamer, and I never feel the need to hit the cap in a week. I usually take my time leveling, read the quest texts, read the books spread arround the world and generally try to soak as much of the lore as I can find, take a good look at surroundings and many times stop when I see something beautiful. If I see something that seems interesting in the distance, I go check it out even if there's no quest goal for me there. Between a job, familly and sport, MMOs are on the last place in my daily priority list.
I picked up Rift on an impulse, without much prior knowledge, because I pretty much stopped following the development of MMOs - nowadays I just stay aware that something is being made, but not much more than that.
So, without any pre-concieved notions of what Rift is supposed to do be, I logged in for the first time on friday, and spent pretty much most of the weekend playing.
The game has an interesting setting, that I feel they could utilise much more. It is definitely high-fantasy, but I was always a sucker fot steampunk and tech-fantasy, so Defiant was an obvious choice. I feel though that they could explore that marriage of magic and tech much more than they do, and that it could be more visible in the world (armor, weapons, gear, buildings etc.). It is there, but it is more subtle.
Mechanics are pretty much the same as any other recent MMO, with the pleasant surprise of the seemingly abundance of choice of the way you develop your character. Min/maxing crowd will probably end up with a couple of best specs, but for everyone else there is tons of choice to be explored. After playing Cataclysm, where they basicaly stripped away everything, down to a point that you have one single choice for one spec, and the only next thing in line is to remove talent trees altogether, it is a very pleasant surprise.
The look of the world and the characters seems to me like a marriage between EQ2 and GW. I whish once, they would make a game where you can make an old mage with grey hair and croocked back, leaning against his staff, and being the Defiant, he would have an artificial eye and a prostetic hand - that would be just too awesome. Rift sticks to the current standard - everyone is young, pretty, either skinny elvish look or muscular square jaw type. Areas seem big to me, as I spent the last two days running arround Freemarch, and it felt big, but still not stretched out.
Quests are standard MMO, go there, kill that, collect that etc. If you read them, they do have an overarching story to it, and while it's not the best fantasy I've ever read, it's good enough to support a game and storytelling in this format. You can learn more from gathering books, which sometimes have pretty interesting stories.
Rifts are fun and though they don't make the world really dynamic, there is something semi unpredictable always happening. Jump-in/jump-out grouping is a huge positive and make you have fun with strangers. I was lucky and did not run into any idiots thus far.
Yesterday, when I was wrapping up the Freemarch, finishing the quests arround Iron Fortress, I started thinking how awesome it would be if I wouldn't be able to wrap up this part of the story on my own. That I would have companions to work with, and spend a couple of hours together, in which time you would talk and grow bonds, instead of just cleaning out the place on my own - and yes, I know that technicaly I could look for a group, but in practice most of the people do stuff on their own when they can. I don't hold this against rift though, because it is a modern standard after all. We sacrificed the team spirit and group bonding for solo convenience, ironicaly in games that should be about socialising in a virtual world. Yes, it is much easier to start up and play today, but it was more enjoyable before.
Maybe everything just went the wrong way, when we got to do everything solo, to combat the long time investment needed for grouping, instead of making the process of finding groups easier. I remember in Outlands in wow, they introduced a feature that you could use a LFG tool for group quests also, which I used alot, yet they removed it, along with group quests, instead of expanding on it - go figure.
All in all, Rift is a very pleasant surprise so far. I hope they go deeper into the tech/magic for the Deviant and spiritual/natural for the Guardians. I also hope they don't decide to start streamlining things to make it more for the masses, the game is already streamlined enough as it is. It's a pleasant marriage of EQ2, GW, LOTRO. and probably least of those WOW, most of all, I'm having fun.
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Edit: typos
Comments
Nice and fair read this
Yea, the game is really strange, now that I've played a character to max level I'll eventually quit... but: The game kept me longer than most other games with lukewarm approaches.
The game never swept me off my feet, I never had any 'wooooow, that's so cool'-moments like in pretty much any other game (first keep battle in WAR; first time to Stormwind in WoW, first time to Rivendell in LotRO, even the fist space battle in Star Trek Online).... It was just kind of okish to play, I guess.
And it kept that pace, if the game had thrown any of the annoyances of other games at me (like the performance problems in initial WAR, the major bugs and crashes in AoC, the ridiculous grind-repeat missions in STO) I'd probably have quit weeks ago. But the game kept a solid pace with an extremely streamlined experience.
Nice. But that's it. In fact it's so polished you can't really find any real flaws in the game. Good for Rift, but for me as a veteran player the game is a streamlined, polished, pretty slideshow of 'been there, done that'.
M
This is also my feeling nothing wrong with the game at all , just not interested in the hamster wheel .
It is entertaining but as veteran gamer there wasn´t a woot moment aside from the first couple of rifts .
There is nothing wrong with the product , just maybe I am getting bored .
Loved the class combinations! Hated the grind! Stopped playing when I hit 50-it was a "now what" moment.
thanks OP. Yes I really like the quests but as of late I am hating doing RIFTS. So far in every RIFT there are lvl 50's. When I 1st started (beta) rifts where hard and you died sometimes and the boss took some time to kill. Its like for the most part no one cares how easy Rifts are now. And it looks like the DEVS are not going to change this any time soon. LOL I said something in game about how Rifts are easy now because there is always a lvl 50 doing some level 7-20 rift. I was to to stop QQ'ing. LMAO they like the fact its easy to get rewards (shards) now with high lvl players. You dont have to work for them at all.
But the game is really easy. All you have to do is explore each zone you do. You will find you get 2+ blues or purples. Or do the puzzle in Silerwood then the one in Freemarch, look around for there are like chests to loot also in each zone. So you end up with over 2plats just in the begining areas alone. Yet you can do this in each zone. You never run out of money and no lie you end up 6 items that will be mostly blues and purples lvl 15.
They say the PVP is really good though..
To streamline it anymore it more they'd have to turn it into a monorail.
By the time you reach 50 you'll understand that while technically nice, you're just playing the same MMO that you've been playing for the past 6 years or so. As long as you're fine with that, great.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
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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
I am struggling with this game. Again Just after I put down DCUO, the second MMO I bought seems to have gone off the boil as well. This game had Aion-plus levels of polish at launch. Good for them. it was boxfresh and ready to go. It's a good game.
My first MMO was CoH. Then RFOnline, a 2 week trial of WoW, TR
I miss you, and a bit of DDO. Rift caught my eyes because of the great class sytem hat allows a huge amount of variation and PvE contol point mechanic that I really like. The problem is that all i see ahead of me is a gear ladder. This is pretty much what killed DCUO for me as well. While the mechanics are great and the game play is great, when I hear thing like "rotations" and macros and T1 and T2... It just gets depressing to have the life of your character mapped out like a never ending tread mill. At the moment I'm subbed bit not really playing too much.
I wish crafting was a bit deeper. I wish that there was more customisation in appearance of armor and weapons. It's almost too conventional for it's own good. I'm gonna give it a final shot and wander my way to 50 but lately I'm getting less and less interested. Which is a shame becaus e the game has a great concept and execution. It's future seems pretty bright. It may or may not include me though.
There is NO miracle patch.
95% of what you see in beta won't change by launch.
Hope is not a stategy.
______________________________
"This kind of topic is like one of those little cartoon boxes held up by a stick on a string, with a piece of meat under it. In other words, bait."
on the surface, yes. in reality, no. not at all.
pretty much every person you see of your calling can be you at the push of a button. and its not "Min/Maxers" finding the best spec..its the people with eyes.
for example you want to make a pyro heavy build..what are you going to sub into it? uh..the one that boosts fire damage and cures your mana problem with only a few points put into it common sense(archon). sure you can pick others.. for exampe stormcaller you can make your air spells crit more while you only use fire spells lol, stuff like that but common sense and looking at the souls for 5 minutes leads everyone to pretty much the same spec.
this is the least customizable 'big' game i have ever played. Its fun to level up/bg for a little, im not here to bash it. but everyone is the same as you(or can be with the push of a button)unless they(or you) suck for the sake of being different.
now don't get me wrong, leveling up you will run into people who are different before they know better. for example my mage level up as a warlock most of the time(witha little necro). there were TONS of heavy necros i would meet and group up with, they thought they were an awesome spec. 5 minutes later im linking them to the 'warlock with soul purge' build and they never use their pet again.
and don't even get me on the gear topic, everyone pre-experts has the same stuff. a few crafted purples and the same blues. sure if you do the same boring daily quests every day for months you can have some different purples from rep vendor just like everyone else that doesn't get bored of that and quit.
I think I've seen a quote like that before Kyleran
Cal.
This doom and gloom thread was brought to you by Chin Up the new ultra high caffeine soft drink for gamers who just need that boost of happiness after a long forum session.
That's because it's true. And it doesn't take to level 50 to figure that out, it takes about an hour or two. Just like it did for AoC, and LotRO, and all the other WoW clones over the years.
You know I see this over and over again and I honestly don't understand it.
People start talking about a virtual world and how you should have to socialize and group. Being able to do anything on your own is bad... or at least if you can do a lot on your own.
Virtual worlds we play in and we live in? The real world? Do you have any idea how much time in real life I spend asking random strangers for help? Do you understand yet why this "must group in a virtual world" mentality confuses me? In virtual worlds we think its standard that a group of people can always do more than an individual. Yet the world we actually live in quite often the opposite is true.
I would ramble off on a sidetrack quite easily so I'll just make 2 basic points and go:
1) The game design is the issue and its not the fact you can solo. Its all about the "stuff". People want the 'stuff' and they want to get it as fast as possible. They are not going to stop and smell the flowers or get to know you. If the random is taking to long they leave. They want to rush through and be on to the next one... more stuff more stuff. Seriously if they lose the roll on the "stuff" they might leave just because... Its why I enjoyed playing a tank in that one paticular MMO.. and I hate playing tanks. I just had a 0 wait time for randoms so if someone left they were immediantly replaced by one of the masses who was eagerly waiting for... stuff.
2) Its also the players. You see all these posts on forums about no one being social and no one grouping. Well... if so many people want to group why aren't they? They are all posting on forums.. but obviously aren't grouping with each other.. ironic?
Yes Garvon and thats why I've had that quote in my sig since Rift launched
Cal.
This doom and gloom thread was brought to you by Chin Up the new ultra high caffeine soft drink for gamers who just need that boost of happiness after a long forum session.
I'm enjoying it. My background is pretty much every mmo since UO for the last 14 years.
There's been a lot said about the familiarity of Rift and that it borrows from other games. Initially that was off putting for me, I felt like I was playing a WAR clone with a bit of WoW and EQ2 thrown in, and because I hadn't enjoyed WAR I was instantly on the defensive and prepared to knock it down. I played a Warrior for the Guardians and found the starter zone up to the time travel bit dull and uninspiring, it is really a 'here's how you play the game' bit. Compared with the intro bit in AoC (not Tortage) it was a bit rubbish but I was on the free trial so I stuck with it. I got out of the starter zone and then had to rescue some unconscious sailors from deepwater, which meant I could swim and dive... excellent I thought.
I didn't progress with the warrior though, I switched to a Defiant Mage, turned up all the graphics and the spell effects, did the starter zone on auto pilot and then into the first area proper... then I really started enjoying myself. I enjoy solo play, I soloed a Minstral in LOTRO up to 65 and the state of mmos thesedays means that the solo game is far more important than it was since there are fewer people playing mmos and more to choose from.
Back to the familiarity bit, this for me was what began to make Rift so enjoyable. It's a great looking world, it is fairly easy to play and very familiar but alongside that the original features of the Rifts, footholds and invasions make it fun, alongside the use of soul trees for characters (i'm loving playing my mage). It the starter area I teamed up in the Rifts, fighting the footholds and several times invasions were fought off by up to twenty players running in from all over the zone, which was absolutely brilliant, zero lag and some of the best gaming i've had in an mmo for some time.
I think the problems with Rift are the problems with all mmos, either be derivative and risk comparison with others that are better, or try to be innovative and crash and burn. I was recently reading about TOR (which I am hoping to play) and some of their innovative ideas sound a bit clunky and unworkable. The other problem with mmos, for me anyway, is that most end up as a single player game with a chat box thesedays (STO is a prime example) and not really worth the monthly fee. In the old days I could sit for hours camping a boss or raiding in EQ with friends, but now we've all got families, jobs and lives, that's just impossible.
Rift is the game that suits the way I live my life now, I guess. It's easy enough, casual and fun solo play with some exciting group elements. I just wish it wasn't charging a monthly fee, and that's probably the only reason i'll stop playing, which is the same reason I stopped playing STO and AoC.
...and WoW is a clone of EQ and DAoC. I don't know why you keep going on about WoW clones, WoW ripped off other games and it didn't come first. AoC and LOTRO are not WoW clones they are combination of many games, some that came before WoW.
It's just ignorance and a lack of gaming history knowledge that makes people use the term wow clone.
yep sick of hearing the term "wow clone" it is ignorant & nieve
The Deathstar destroyed planets...Lucas Arts destroyed Galaxies
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Played:
SWG | EVE | WOW | VG | LOTRO | WAR | FML | STO | APB | AOC | MORTAL | WOT | BP | SW:TOR
This was started with EQ, raiding for the best kit etc... not WoW. The endgame in EQ set the model for guild raids that has continued ever since. We can't blame WoW for hardcore power gaming, it started in EQ and even more so because it wasn't easy at all in that game and you had to wait your turn with other guilds to take on bosses.