Originally posted by Airwren Bill I've had my issues with this website in the past but I will say you are one of the writers here that I still enjoy reading. You always try to provide solid information when you can with a balanced approach. Thanks for sharing this information. I will say that this game excites me and bums me out all at the same time. I think there are things that could be enjoyed in the game and it looks interesting to me, but there's the giant stink of the SWTOR experience that leaves me cautious about this game. Still not enough information available to make me WANT to pre-order. Probably going to sit this one out for a bit. Sadly as well, I've been in the wildstar beta for a while and the game is not for me. I'm still hoping somehow Archeage is coming and not a complete turd when it gets here.
Thanks, Airwen, I appreciate that.
For what it's worth, I'll be buying and playing both ESO and WS, because they're fun and varied themeparks. But I'm also really waiting and hoping ArcheAge comes here and wows me.
Try to be excellent to everyone you meet. You never know what someone else has seen or endured.
Just want to reiterate what I said elsewhere: the NDA still applies to non-press. This means you cannot offer or discuss any of your impressions of the beta, even if its stuff touched on in any of our articles today until ZOS drops the NDA for everyone.
I know that puts many of you who have played the beta in a weird place when looking to comment on this article since you have your own experiences to relate back to, but please keep this in mind when posting. Thanks!
Wait everyone with a blog/facebook/twitter/whateversocialmedia site is "press" .....................right?
While I agree that the first few levels are linear,with not very interesting quests, a player can still get a good idea about rest of the game in terms of : character animations, graphics, how good is the music (some of us still listen to in game music) and other small things like emotes,being able to use furniture etc which show if developers care about making a world or just a game. So it is a good idea for companies to have a good start, with some impressive vistas and a polished player experience - I still remember entering Darnassus for the first time or meeting my dark elf mentor in Freeport. From my own experience when trying to get friends to play a mmo,first few hours in game were enough for them to buy it or give up, because the game didn't impressed them.
Yeah but also keep in mind that a great start doesn't equal a great game, Age of Conan is a prime example of that, it may have had the best 1-20 in MMO history and fell like a meteor after that in terms of quality. It also had great animations, graphics and in game music. I would actually say that Age of Conan had better graphics, animations and music than TESO does but I doubt TESO will be THAT bad of a game, but still bad. Then again, TESO wont last as a sub as long as AoC did. Nevermind.
"People who tell you youre awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is." ~Raph Koster http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/
Thanks for the article. I thought the armor looked terrible. I was hoping for more 3D armor rather than painted-on character model style. For some reason I was looking forward to seeing what they did with robes, as I have yet to see a game that gets that voluminous, flowing style of a mage done properly. Combat looked clunky as well, although the spell effects were nice.
I think there is too little to go on for me at this point. My only issues were with esthetics, as I like the crafting depth and the skill system. I am looking forward to hearing more about AvA, how they manage skill progression with that, and generally about the greater chunk of the game post level 15.
Oh, is there CC? Can you build a mage that can mez/stun/charm, or is it all dps?
Interesting that they dropped the NDA ONLY for Press. Frankly that alone would leave me a bit apprehensive. Is that common practice these days?
I believe I can say that I'm not in the beta's and have had no experience of the game....so I really have no idea if it's the best thing ever or a turd on a stick. However I simply won't take reviews published by employee's for venues that accept paid advertisement from the products they are reviewing. No disrespect to mmorpg.com or any individual but I wouldn't accept it from a car magazine or a golf magazine either. There is simply too much potential for conflict of interest with that.
Well saod and until they drop the NDA or at the least revert their decision to have an Open Beta there will be questions and never enough answers.
Sandbox means open world, non-linear gaming PERIOD!
Subscription Gaming, especially MMO gaming is a Cash grab bigger then the most P2W cash shop!
Bring Back Exploration and lengthy progression times. RPG's have always been about the Journey not the destination!!!
One of the negatives you pointed out is actually a selling point to me. The idea of being hours in and only level 10 is actually a plus. I am so weary of the super fast pace of games these days, everyone rushing to level cap, then swamping the forums about how there is nothing left to do.
A game slow to level in, and challenging to do so, sounds awesome.
I am not going to say this will be the best game to come out in the genre, or even in the top five, maybe not the top ten, but it will at least be a pleasant MMORPG diversion.
One of the negatives you pointed out is actually a selling point to me. The idea of being hours in and only level 10 is actually a plus. I am so weary of the super fast pace of games these days, everyone rushing to level cap, then swamping the forums about how there is nothing left to do.
A game slow to level in, and challenging to do so, sounds awesome.
I am not going to say this will be the best game to come out in the genre, or even in the top five, maybe not the top ten, but it will at least be a pleasant MMORPG diversion.
He took hours to get to 10, but he is trying to preview the game so he is doing everything. I will bet $100 that someone will be max level in 3 days because the game is no different than any other MMO made in a long time, easy to just get XP and level up quickly.
if you want a slow leveling MMO, you may want to look into Korean MMOs or TSW which has no levels, something this game should have done.
"People who tell you youre awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is." ~Raph Koster http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/
Just want to reiterate what I said elsewhere: the NDA still applies to non-press. This means you cannot offer or discuss any of your impressions of the beta, even if its stuff touched on in any of our articles today until ZOS drops the NDA for everyone.
I know that puts many of you who have played the beta in a weird place when looking to comment on this article since you have your own experiences to relate back to, but please keep this in mind when posting. Thanks!
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It does indeed. While there are points to make about the article, in the end I can only write "no comment."
So they are basicly confident enough to charge a box price (and not a budget one), a monthly sub and apply a cash shop on top of it -but at the same time they aren't confident enough to let people talk about their game or show anyone whats beyond the current level cap? Plus theyl want to lure people who are not allowed to inform themselves properly about the product into preordering and buy a cat in a sack?
If that is not enough to get your spider sense tingling, i have a bridge on the moon to sell -but shhhhh....you aren't allowed to talk about it.
I’ll admit something, that’s probably apparent from earlier previews and columns I’ve written: I’ve been wary of Elder Scrolls Online living up to the immense hype created by the Elder Scrolls IP. And yet, with every passing time I’ve seen the game, I’ve seen many of my worries addressed by (most notably) making ESO feel more like a true entry into the Elder Scrolls franchise. Today we’re going to have a lot of previews for you. From starting zones to crafting, to fifteen minutes of our own in-game footage. You’ll get several different views on the game, but for my part I’m going to list the good and bad of what I’ve played so far. This was the first time I’ve really been able to focus on one character and play for over ten hours, and I can say definitively: I’m now getting very excited to play this game for real at launch.
The armor doesn't look that bad.. I think that's making a mountain out of a mole hill. Sure.. some armor is like that but you can clearly see in videos and screen shots that there are tons of armor pieces that add more shape and are not just a texture.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
So they are basicly confident enough to charge a box price (and not a budget one), a monthly sub and apply a cash shop on top of it -but at the same time they aren't confident enough to let people talk about their game or show anyone whats beyond the current level cap? Plus theyl want to lure people who are not allowed to inform themselves properly about the product into preordering and buy a cat in a sack?
If that is not enough to get your spider sense tingling, i have a bridge on the moon to sell -but shhhhh....you aren't allowed to talk about it.
I know right? They should let us play to level cap as well as doing everything in between for a couple of months to prove it doesn't get old and reveal absolutely everything about the game. If they don't they obviously know that they just developed this game to steal everyones money with the box price! Seriously its a shame that there have been so many bad MMOs that people have become so paranoid and jaded that unless they know absolutely every single little detail about the game, that it is seen as a con.
The NDA I don't even understand it being equated to hiding anything. Whether it is lifted before late March or not, you're not forced to buy the game. Besides once head start begins, there is no way NDA can continue at that point. Honestly a lot of people just seem like chicken littles of conspiracy theorists. Heck single player games you don't get the amount of information that seems to be what people deem required before they purchase an MMO. Far Cry 3 I got about as much detail as you can find on the net with ESO, which was enough for me to put my money up and hope I liked it.
So they are basicly confident enough to charge a box price (and not a budget one), a monthly sub and apply a cash shop on top of it -but at the same time they aren't confident enough to let people talk about their game or show anyone whats beyond the current level cap? Plus theyl want to lure people who are not allowed to inform themselves properly about the product into preordering and buy a cat in a sack?
If that is not enough to get your spider sense tingling, i have a bridge on the moon to sell -but shhhhh....you aren't allowed to talk about it.
I know right? They should let us play to level cap as well as doing everything in between for a couple of months to prove it doesn't get old and reveal absolutely everything about the game. If they don't they obviously know that they just developed this game to steal everyones money with the box price! Seriously its a shame that there have been so many bad MMOs that people have become so paranoid and jaded that unless they know absolutely every single little detail about the game, that it is seen as a con.
The NDA I don't even understand it being equated to hiding anything. Whether it is lifted before late March or not, you're not forced to buy the game. Besides once head start begins, there is no way NDA can continue at that point. Honestly a lot of people just seem like chicken littles of conspiracy theorists. Heck single player games you don't get the amount of information that seems to be what people deem required before they purchase an MMO. Far Cry 3 I got about as much detail as you can find on the net with ESO, which was enough for me to put my money up and hope I liked it.
I'll tell you exactly why they won't drop the NDA..
Because the version people are using to test for server stability is an old client.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
This will be F2P soon and I may give it a go then.
I also don't get why people were so offended by the NDA. You could find game play videos and enough information of how ESO was going to turn out. People on both sides seem to think that a video from a year ago doesn't portray the actual game at release. No game is going to change that much in a year. The game play videos they released a while ago look exactly the same as the video this guy just released, now that the NDA was lifted, lol.
"I can't say anything right now, cause of the NDA, but the game is awesome"
"The game is terrible, I can't say anything because of the NDA though"
You guys crack me up. I can see the game right there. The NDA wasn't covering anything up.
(edit)
The poster above me is a prime example. Listen to that guy. lol. He thinks the game at release is going to be some magical unicorn suddenly and that the makers of ESO have been 'hiding' this magical release. Hilarious.
The user and all related content has been deleted.
Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
I'll tell you exactly why they won't drop the NDA..
Because the version people are using to test for server stability is an old client.
Magical patch incoming on release day!!
I've been waiting for someone pulling that card already...
Yeh, I said magical patch didn't I?
They have already stated it's a totally incomplete client. Hell, it's only 1-17.. and since they claim 33% of content is the levelling content.. it's not really accurate to judge something based on.. what? 11% of the final product?
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
Thanks for the vid Bill, I agree with you about the armour hopefully they'll polish it. Like your self I'll be using First person mode when I'm able to play, I'm currently playing Skyrim now I was hoping for the same animations like we have in Skyrim but it's better than nothing. But so far from watching your vid I think it's definitely worth subbing to.
Vannor, I have never EVER seen a game this close to release change as much as you think ESO will on release. I can tell you with almost 100% certainty that what you see with this preview is what you get judging by my past experiences in numerous betas, including SWTOR (in which people were saying the exact same thing you just did).
If you saw / read this preview and you liked what you saw, great, you might like the game. If you think there is some miracle patch coming and they are hiding the "real" version of the game you probably shouldn't be holding your breath.
Originally posted by Teala I liked your little preview, and you made some valid good and bad points, but....sheesh...you dodged a lot of things about the game that you could have covered since you can talk about levels 1-15. Since I am not an official game reporter I cannot make a list of my own good and bad(due to NDA), because really...there are some key things I think you neglected to bring up. But hey, Zenimax clearly only wants it to continue their little game of obfuscate the reality of the game. Did they have to pre-approve what you wrote?
Nope. But let's say you looked at my video... what stuck out to you? I will say we can't cover AVA until next week, but the cap for this week is level 15.
The limited hotbar.
How does it actually play out? Did you find it limiting, or was it workable?
Really lost me when you said that the animations are light years ahead of what was in any of the single player games. No way does ESO have better animations than Skyrim, in fact they're pretty horrible. Every character in every video I've seen is bent over like they've got a herniated disc in their back, when they fight.
Once upon a time Blizzard developed an MMO by refining what could be found in existing MMO's to make a more appealing game. Everything I'm seeing would indicate that Zeni Online was doing the same thing, but based mostly on games that were in development, that they thought were going to pave the way for what a next gen MMO would be.
They say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery. Arena net is blushing right now.
Comments
Thanks, Airwen, I appreciate that.
For what it's worth, I'll be buying and playing both ESO and WS, because they're fun and varied themeparks. But I'm also really waiting and hoping ArcheAge comes here and wows me.
Try to be excellent to everyone you meet. You never know what someone else has seen or endured.
My Review Manifesto
Follow me on Twitter if you dare.
Wait everyone with a blog/facebook/twitter/whateversocialmedia site is "press" .....................right?
Yeah but also keep in mind that a great start doesn't equal a great game, Age of Conan is a prime example of that, it may have had the best 1-20 in MMO history and fell like a meteor after that in terms of quality. It also had great animations, graphics and in game music. I would actually say that Age of Conan had better graphics, animations and music than TESO does but I doubt TESO will be THAT bad of a game, but still bad. Then again, TESO wont last as a sub as long as AoC did. Nevermind.
"People who tell you youre awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is." ~Raph Koster
http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/
Thanks for the article. I thought the armor looked terrible. I was hoping for more 3D armor rather than painted-on character model style. For some reason I was looking forward to seeing what they did with robes, as I have yet to see a game that gets that voluminous, flowing style of a mage done properly. Combat looked clunky as well, although the spell effects were nice.
I think there is too little to go on for me at this point. My only issues were with esthetics, as I like the crafting depth and the skill system. I am looking forward to hearing more about AvA, how they manage skill progression with that, and generally about the greater chunk of the game post level 15.
Oh, is there CC? Can you build a mage that can mez/stun/charm, or is it all dps?
The best thing about this game is asdasdasdadadaslfdhkjshdfkjhsjkfhajkhdkjahjkdhkjahd
Considering that TES is generally praised for its sandbox-y parts, that sounds... not good.
Well saod and until they drop the NDA or at the least revert their decision to have an Open Beta there will be questions and never enough answers.
Sandbox means open world, non-linear gaming PERIOD!
Subscription Gaming, especially MMO gaming is a Cash grab bigger then the most P2W cash shop!
Bring Back Exploration and lengthy progression times. RPG's have always been about the Journey not the destination!!!
One of the negatives you pointed out is actually a selling point to me. The idea of being hours in and only level 10 is actually a plus. I am so weary of the super fast pace of games these days, everyone rushing to level cap, then swamping the forums about how there is nothing left to do.
A game slow to level in, and challenging to do so, sounds awesome.
I am not going to say this will be the best game to come out in the genre, or even in the top five, maybe not the top ten, but it will at least be a pleasant MMORPG diversion.
He took hours to get to 10, but he is trying to preview the game so he is doing everything. I will bet $100 that someone will be max level in 3 days because the game is no different than any other MMO made in a long time, easy to just get XP and level up quickly.
if you want a slow leveling MMO, you may want to look into Korean MMOs or TSW which has no levels, something this game should have done.
"People who tell you youre awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is." ~Raph Koster
http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/
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...
It does indeed. While there are points to make about the article, in the end I can only write "no comment."
So they are basicly confident enough to charge a box price (and not a budget one), a monthly sub and apply a cash shop on top of it -but at the same time they aren't confident enough to let people talk about their game or show anyone whats beyond the current level cap? Plus theyl want to lure people who are not allowed to inform themselves properly about the product into preordering and buy a cat in a sack?
If that is not enough to get your spider sense tingling, i have a bridge on the moon to sell -but shhhhh....you aren't allowed to talk about it.
Bill, did you not click the veteran gear tab in character creation? so not painted on.
I know right? They should let us play to level cap as well as doing everything in between for a couple of months to prove it doesn't get old and reveal absolutely everything about the game. If they don't they obviously know that they just developed this game to steal everyones money with the box price! Seriously its a shame that there have been so many bad MMOs that people have become so paranoid and jaded that unless they know absolutely every single little detail about the game, that it is seen as a con.
The NDA I don't even understand it being equated to hiding anything. Whether it is lifted before late March or not, you're not forced to buy the game. Besides once head start begins, there is no way NDA can continue at that point. Honestly a lot of people just seem like chicken littles of conspiracy theorists. Heck single player games you don't get the amount of information that seems to be what people deem required before they purchase an MMO. Far Cry 3 I got about as much detail as you can find on the net with ESO, which was enough for me to put my money up and hope I liked it.
I'll tell you exactly why they won't drop the NDA..
Because the version people are using to test for server stability is an old client.
This will be F2P soon and I may give it a go then.
I also don't get why people were so offended by the NDA. You could find game play videos and enough information of how ESO was going to turn out. People on both sides seem to think that a video from a year ago doesn't portray the actual game at release. No game is going to change that much in a year. The game play videos they released a while ago look exactly the same as the video this guy just released, now that the NDA was lifted, lol.
"I can't say anything right now, cause of the NDA, but the game is awesome"
"The game is terrible, I can't say anything because of the NDA though"
You guys crack me up. I can see the game right there. The NDA wasn't covering anything up.
(edit)
The poster above me is a prime example. Listen to that guy. lol. He thinks the game at release is going to be some magical unicorn suddenly and that the makers of ESO have been 'hiding' this magical release. Hilarious.
Magical patch incoming on release day!!
I've been waiting for someone pulling that card already...
Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
Yeh, I said magical patch didn't I?
They have already stated it's a totally incomplete client. Hell, it's only 1-17.. and since they claim 33% of content is the levelling content.. it's not really accurate to judge something based on.. what? 11% of the final product?
If you saw / read this preview and you liked what you saw, great, you might like the game. If you think there is some miracle patch coming and they are hiding the "real" version of the game you probably shouldn't be holding your breath.
The limited hotbar.
How does it actually play out? Did you find it limiting, or was it workable?
NDA is in place while they accept dollars for pre-orders.
Hmmmm.
This hype feels a lot like the build up to SWTOR, and that's a very average game.
In fact, this game seems to have a lot of SWTOR like mechanics.
Hmmmmm.
Ya, probably wait for the F2P.
Really lost me when you said that the animations are light years ahead of what was in any of the single player games. No way does ESO have better animations than Skyrim, in fact they're pretty horrible. Every character in every video I've seen is bent over like they've got a herniated disc in their back, when they fight.
Once upon a time Blizzard developed an MMO by refining what could be found in existing MMO's to make a more appealing game. Everything I'm seeing would indicate that Zeni Online was doing the same thing, but based mostly on games that were in development, that they thought were going to pave the way for what a next gen MMO would be.
They say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery. Arena net is blushing right now.