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Rreview of WoW from veteran MMORPG player
admriker444
Member Posts: 1,526
My credentials...
1. Ultima - played at launch for 3 years.
2. DAoC - Played on and off for 2 years
3. CoH played in beta through launch for 1 year. Still play on occasion
4. SWG - Played from beta 2 through everything until NGE hit, left soon after (2.5 yrs)
5. Matrix - played in beta
6. D&D - played the stress test
7. EQ2 - Played for about 2 months
8. AC2 - Tried a 14 day free trial twice
9. FF11 - Played for about 1 month
10. Horizons - played from about 6 months
11. Eve - Tried 14 day trial
12. Saga of Ryzom - Tried 14 day trial
13. WoW - Played at launch for about 3 months. Returned several times (3) for usually 1-2 months each time. Currently playing 55 paladin on shadow council
As you can see Ive just about played most mmorpgs around so I have a large basis of comparison. My review..( based on 10 being highest and 1 lowest)
1. Graphics - While definitely simplistic, there is much attention to detail. However, one thing bothers me is there isnt much difference from low settings to maxed out ones. Sure I get to see footprints in sand but where are the better graphics ? Where are the shadows ? Where is the sparkling details one should see if they're able to crank everything to maximum ? Also the areas all look to similiar. You have 4 basic areas, swamps...snowy lands, burned out areas, and deserts and they all look the same. Too cartoonish for my taste and pixelated. Score - 4
2. Combat - From a balance perspective, the game shines. There are issues with shaman still but otherwise pretty fairly decent job. Each class has a defined role with some flexibility as to playstyle. Game is level-based though so its pretty easy to balance the classes unlike say in a skill-based one. Attacks are basic and simplistic. The attack or spell you use at lvl 6 will probably be the same one you use at lvl 60, only stronger. Score - 5
3. Crafting - If you've ever preferred playing a decent crafting game then WoW isnt for you. Most are pretty pointless and cost way too much time and gold to bother with. I worked on armorsmith till lvl 278. At 225 I trained for armorsmith (from blacksmith) and found out there were only two recipes I could buy. The rest were all drops. Now after spending a month grinding into the late night for mithril and iron, this was quite depressing. The recipes for decent stuff usually are found on AH but the prices are ridiculous. Finally, loot drops and quest rewards especially at the later stages are almost always better than anything crafted.
I played a warlock to lvl 60 and went alchemy / herbology. The problem there is many times potions will drop. Or there are repeatable quests to get them. In Tanaris, one can farm water pouches from NPC and turn them in for crates of goods. Many times there will be mana potions or healing ones in there. Same thing in Ungoro Crater, repeatable quest which gets you nice potions. Also, since WoW servers allow multiple toons to be made on each one, players arent dependent on each other for goods. So even though potions are a consumable, most dont sell tons of them. Anyone can simply just create another toon and craft potions if they really want them.
There arent any vendors you can use to sell your own goods. And since there isnt any housing, one cant set up a shop or mall either. The AH or spamming is pretty much the only way to sell stuff.
No decay means tons of peeps will simply never ever need your goods. Also since WoW allows multiple toons per server peeps simply will take their lvl 60 toon and farm a low lvl instance for gear for the next toon they make. Many times I ran across a lvl 10 rogue who already had gear in his bank for every level. Again, lack of relying on others (a staple of most mmorpgs) is the glaring issue here.
Score - 3
4. Community - What can I say to some up WoW's community...hmm. Well worst mmorpg community comes quickly to mind. I have never in any mmorpg seen such an awful foul-mouthed community of children ever. If they arent discussing their mating rituals or getting drunk, they're arguing about something ridiculous. I cant recall how many thousands of times Ive seen some poor fella ask a simple quest like where is something and bam major flame war breaks out. Just try selling some item and watch out because 50+ peeps will give their opinion on whether your price is fair.
Most of the players in WoW seemingly are NOT mmorpg vets. They have little clue on how to act, conduct themselves, nor play their class properly. Many times Ive seen warriors with no shields trying to play the rogue. Or watched in horror as a warlock ran into the middle of a mob and dropped an AOE on them (then swore at priest cause he died). Its a really lucky day if you actually find a decent group to run all the way through an instance.
Guilds are like nothing Ive ever seen in other mmorpgs. In other mmorpgs, joining a guild is an important step in playing the game. It usually involves a recommendation from another member. It might require joining them for an instance or group hunt to test out your skills. It could require tribute of goods or gold. Some even have websites that require filling out applications as well. In WoW its a completely different animal which is a reflection of the lack of maturity of the community. Peeps will invite players to join their guild without even talking to them first. Others will spam looking for others to sign their charter and arent required to join after (for some reason many just want to start a guild but dont care if anyone joins it ???)
I've bounced around in several guilds. Some disbanded. Others were maybe 5 players playing 30 toons (all alts) so nobody was ever on. Most are full of selfish players that rarely group together to benefit each other.
Some servers are designated as role playing. However very little RP goes on there. Again the maturity factor here really hurts. What WoW really needs is an Adults only server
Score - 1
5. PvP - Two major glaring issues with PvP in my opinion. One, its way too fast. There really isnt much time to bother with strategy. Its just mash buttons and hope you win. After experiencing SWG where one might spend 30 minutes battling a bounty hunter, this WoW PvP leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Second, the Honor system doesnt work. I played on several PvP severs, they were all the same....GANKFEST. Many times I had to log off in disgust because of the ganking that would occur. Dont get me wrong, I have no problem getting attacked by an enemy if I quest or explore in neutral or enemy territory. However, when I continually getting slain by a lvl 60 rogue and Im only 12, well thats just stupid. The Honor system is supposed to penalize someone into NOT attacking such lower level players.
My last night playing on a PvP server went like this....I was a lvl 14 paladin. I was in Westfall trying to quest. A swarm of horde were there doing some major griefing. They kept killing the quest giver I needed to turn in my quest for the pocketwatch and collecting oats. This horde literally just sat there and killed him anytime he spawned.
Other horde players camped the graveyard and would gank anyone reviving. Or they would camp the griphon so we couldnt fly out. Many stood in the entrance to DM so no alliance could approach to get in.
This went on for 5 days. Finally I gave up and moved on to a so-called Role-Playing server.
Score - 1
6. Animations / emotes - Combat animations really are quite awful in WoW. I get really bored watching my paladin doing the same slash over and over and over and over and over again. Oh wait, he just did a different slash for a critical hit, neat. Oh here we go again, slash over and over and over bleh. Emotes, like the community are simplistic and uninspiring. After seeing the same naked elf dance in IF a few thousand times you get tired of them. Absolutely the worst Ive ever seen in a mmorpg.
Score - 1
7. Game Economy - In short, a total mess. Because of the 5+ million players, gold farmers have set up shop in the game. Prices have skyrocketed since launch day. And because prices for items have gotten so high, many players are almost forced to buy gold from the very source of the problem (how ironic) Its quite common to see a blue item sword with average dps selling for 150g ouch. At launch even epics didnt go above 100g, now they sell for 2000g.
When I came back after a several month break I was shocked at the number of tells I'd get from peeps offering to sell me gold or directing me to their company website. At least twice a day I get one offering this. I have never ever been solicited in any other mmorpg before.
Score - 1
8. Sound - Basically non-existent. Besides the music you hear upon entering SW or the occasional grunt while swing your sword, its just silent. If you crank the volume you might notice your mail armor making a clinking sound while you walk. Otherwise, its obvious Blizzard cared very little for doing anything innovative here.
Score - 1
9. Immersive Factor - There are some neat things here. You'll run across schoolchildren following a teacher around. You'll see and hear two kids chattering on about fishing. During the Holidays, Blizzard does a real nice job in adding festive things. In small towns like Goldshire you might hear a vendor announce they're leaving soon so stop by to check out their goods.
Score - 7
10. Quests - The one thing WoW really shines in is the quests. They're immersive, well written and interesting. They also take away that awful feeling of "ah I need to grind". Yes some are repetitive like kill and bring back 10 buzzard wings. Most though tell a story and lead to many more fine quests. Blizzard did a fine job here.
Score - 9
Total score 33, Rating - 3.3 / 10
Comments
many people say that it's a very good game but from ur review, i finally decided to not to play and not even bother to try WoW. or maybe ur just scoring very low? lol, anyways i trust ur judgement.
"It's definitely better to be lazy than being tired of doing all the chores!"
Trust me, his description is pretty accurate.
You know you can review this game in the proper section by clicking on the WoW logo on this site then click on the "ratings" tab.
I enjoyed reading your review. It is a pleasant change to find someone that can articulate their thoughts using "the King's English" rather than "l33t-speak." I too have played a number of different MMORPGs and have enjoyed them most when I could really immerse myself into the game. I admit that this is more difficult with WoW. But unfortunately, it is the best thing available right now (for me) and it is fun for the casual gamer like myself. Also, I don't think your text reviews correlate with your numeric reviews. As another user already suggested, a "1" implies it is worse than anything out there. While this is your opinion, I find it hard to justify.
As for the community... I agree it is absolutely horrible. I found a remedy by joining TOG, The Older Gamers, a few months ago. I've played with them in GW, SWG and finally in WoW. I've really enjoyed their company and their very helpful and mature attitudes. So much so that I left my native server, Suramar, and my guild in order to join them on Proudmoore. Often when playing I just use the guild chat window, so I don't even notice the foul-mouthed young-lings. Even better, older players are less apt to abandon you in the middle of an instance because "mom is calling for dinner."
Anyways, thank you for the very thought-out review. I wish more people took the time to offer such detailed opinions.
Admriker444,you never reviewed the gameplay of the game. That is a key-point in a game,if it's gameplay is crap the game is crap. Plain and simple. So Admriker,how about you add in a review of the gameplay?
I've heard of WoW's community being crappy,but I never imagined it would be that bad.
"The one who begins with nothing, gains everything slowly."
If I rated any game this low, I certainly wouldn't be playing it.
This reminds me a review from a couple of years ago, some guy saying
"Everquest is boring, I played it for 3 years and I am tired of it".
I remember, it made me think - if it can be played for 3 years, it's pretty damn good.
The rating for quality of quests is important though - WOW is the first game
I see where quests actually seem to follow a storyline. For example, when
I play EQ2, it just saddens me how many quests are mundane tasks that
have nothing to do with the story.
Whatever aspect he didn't like he gave a 1, which isn't a fair assessment.
No offense admrikser444, but your numerical rating seems a bit odd. By giving ones in most of your catagories, you imply that World of Warcraft is one of the worst games ever created. In addition, I find this hard to believe considering you managed to hit 60 on a character (which thus implies you enjoyed the majority of the game and its mechanics.)
I once had a case like this... directly after I stopped playing EQ I thought it was one of the worst games ever because I had "wasted" so much time in it. Now, I know Everquest one of the better games and I could not score it any lower than a 7 in a review. I attribute this to me feeling a bit emotional towards the game at the time which didn't allow any logic or reason.
I don't know about your server, but when you describe community related occurences (such as the economy/ guild issues) I find it not to be as bad as you describe. I haven't yet left the guild on my 47 priest that I joined at level 13. Same with my 49 mage. In addition, I've never seen a blue priced over 40g.
Once again, I cannot speak for every server, but on my RP-PvP server (Twisting Nether) I run into RP sessions daily. It's usually hard to find a person that isn't interesting in roleplaying (so far I've seen that all guilds require maturity and roleplaying.) I've been playing on Twisting Nether for awhile now and I haven't ran into ANY inherently annoying people. Furthermore, do we really need to go into why age does not equal maturity?
All in all, there may be some truth to your review, but it's tangled and covered in over-exaggerations.
Did we play the same game? For that matter, what other types of areas were looking for? There's snowy lands, forests, swamps, deserts, burned and blasted areas... pretty much the same as anywhere in the real world.
I also notice you never mentioned instances and the areas you find there, which is an odd omission since they're probably the most important areas of the game. They have a pretty wide variety of scenarios there, some with some pretty outstanding artwork.
Cartoonish and pixelated?
http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/439/auberdine6dv.jpg
That's a screenshot I took at the resolution I play at. The atmosphere in many areas of the game is outstanding. If you're missing shadows and such, you have something turned off.
There arent any vendors you can use to sell your own goods. And since there isnt any housing, one cant set up a shop or mall either. The AH or spamming is pretty much the only way to sell stuff.
...and what's wrong with that? The auction houses work better to sell things and are easier to use than any other setup I've run into in an MMO. Things are set up this way because it's simple and easy and accessible, not to mention more fun than running all over the place trying to find what you want like in the bazaar of EQ or the housing merchants of DaoC.
No decay means tons of peeps will simply never ever need your goods. Also since WoW allows multiple toons per server peeps simply will take their lvl 60 toon and farm a low lvl instance for gear for the next toon they make. Many times I ran across a lvl 10 rogue who already had gear in his bank for every level. Again, lack of relying on others (a staple of most mmorpgs) is the glaring issue here.
Items bind when equipped; once you put it on, it can't be traded. Crafters are highly valued at higher levels, and many extremely good items require a high skill (and can be sold for lots of money). There are a LOT of people playing in any case; you can sell things of any level and make money if you do it at a reasonable price.
4. Community - What can I say to some up WoW's community...hmm. Well worst mmorpg community comes quickly to mind. I have never in any mmorpg seen such an awful foul-mouthed community of children ever. If they arent discussing their mating rituals or getting drunk, they're arguing about something ridiculous. I cant recall how many thousands of times Ive seen some poor fella ask a simple quest like where is something and bam major flame war breaks out. Just try selling some item and watch out because 50+ peeps will give their opinion on whether your price is fair.
Most of the players in WoW seemingly are NOT mmorpg vets. They have little clue on how to act, conduct themselves, nor play their class properly. Many times Ive seen warriors with no shields trying to play the rogue. Or watched in horror as a warlock ran into the middle of a mob and dropped an AOE on them (then swore at priest cause he died). Its a really lucky day if you actually find a decent group to run all the way through an instance.
Try Guild Wars.
Turn off General Chat.
Poof... problem solved. Yes, there are some wankers. It's not MOST, but some servers are certainly better than others. The only difference between this and other MMO's is the openness of the chat system; you can talk to entire areas more easily than most other games. It sucks because of losers like you mentioned, but it's great when looking for groups. There's a good side and a bad side to it; use /ignore and you'll notice how fast the system starts to work better.
Guilds are like nothing Ive ever seen in other mmorpgs. In other mmorpgs, joining a guild is an important step in playing the game. It usually involves a recommendation from another member. It might require joining them for an instance or group hunt to test out your skills. It could require tribute of goods or gold. Some even have websites that require filling out applications as well. In WoW its a completely different animal which is a reflection of the lack of maturity of the community. Peeps will invite players to join their guild without even talking to them first. Others will spam looking for others to sign their charter and arent required to join after (for some reason many just want to start a guild but dont care if anyone joins it ???)
I've bounced around in several guilds. Some disbanded. Others were maybe 5 players playing 30 toons (all alts) so nobody was ever on. Most are full of selfish players that rarely group together to benefit each other.
This is absolutely no different than any other game. There are drive-by invite guilds, and there are more close-knit friends in guilds. People spam about signing their charter because it requires 10 people to create the guild in the first place, and they'll worry about filling it once its made.
My experience with the guild system here is that it's exactly the same as every other MMO I've played.
Some servers are designated as role playing. However very little RP goes on there. Again the maturity factor here really hurts. What WoW really needs is an Adults only server
Score - 1
I play on an RP server. There's roleplaying if you look for it, and there's not if you don't. Maturity is much higher on the RP servers when compared to most others, but don't mistake maturity for age; a lot of the wankers you're talking about are the same age as you and me, and aren't teenagers at all.
5. PvP - Two major glaring issues with PvP in my opinion. One, its way too fast. There really isnt much time to bother with strategy. Its just mash buttons and hope you win. After experiencing SWG where one might spend 30 minutes battling a bounty hunter, this WoW PvP leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Second, the Honor system doesnt work. I played on several PvP severs, they were all the same....GANKFEST. Many times I had to log off in disgust because of the ganking that would occur. Dont get me wrong, I have no problem getting attacked by an enemy if I quest or explore in neutral or enemy territory. However, when I continually getting slain by a lvl 60 rogue and Im only 12, well thats just stupid. The Honor system is supposed to penalize someone into NOT attacking such lower level players.
My last night playing on a PvP server went like this....I was a lvl 14 paladin. I was in Westfall trying to quest. A swarm of horde were there doing some major griefing. They kept killing the quest giver I needed to turn in my quest for the pocketwatch and collecting oats. This horde literally just sat there and killed him anytime he spawned.
Other horde players camped the graveyard and would gank anyone reviving. Or they would camp the griphon so we couldnt fly out. Many stood in the entrance to DM so no alliance could approach to get in.
This went on for 5 days. Finally I gave up and moved on to a so-called Role-Playing server.
The last night you played on the PvP server they were ganking the quest giver, and it went on for 5 days. Which was it? The last night, or for 5 days?
Don't play on a PvP server. They're well known for being a gankfest; you'd know that by your experience in UO and other open-pvp games.
Again, it's odd that you talk about PvP but never even mention the battlegrounds. If you think there's no strategy to PvP, you've never done it and you've never fought in a battleground.
Score - 1
6. Animations / emotes - Combat animations really are quite awful in WoW. I get really bored watching my paladin doing the same slash over and over and over and over and over again. Oh wait, he just did a different slash for a critical hit, neat. Oh here we go again, slash over and over and over bleh. Emotes, like the community are simplistic and uninspiring. After seeing the same naked elf dance in IF a few thousand times you get tired of them. Absolutely the worst Ive ever seen in a mmorpg.
Score - 1
...again, did we play the same game? There are a lot of emotes, every race and gender has different ones, and they're fluid and generally well done.
You also use the worst class example in a paladin, where auto-attack is their core melee base. Pick a class that uses abilities often if you want something like that; every ability uses its own animation.
7. Game Economy - In short, a total mess. Because of the 5+ million players, gold farmers have set up shop in the game. Prices have skyrocketed since launch day. And because prices for items have gotten so high, many players are almost forced to buy gold from the very source of the problem (how ironic) Its quite common to see a blue item sword with average dps selling for 150g ouch. At launch even epics didnt go above 100g, now they sell for 2000g.
Yes, the economy is fairly messed up... but the little secret of those high priced blues and purples is that you don't have to buy them. Go get them yourself; you'll get better items doing the instances you never mentioned than buying items you don't want or can't afford from the AH you don't like.
8. Sound - Basically non-existent. Besides the music you hear upon entering SW or the occasional grunt while swing your sword, its just silent. If you crank the volume you might notice your mail armor making a clinking sound while you walk. Otherwise, its obvious Blizzard cared very little for doing anything innovative here.
Score - 1
Wow man... just wow. You're really just making this up now.
Go stand on the boat once. You hear the echo of wood from the planks below, the creak of the masts in the wind and the sound of the surf. The music is outstanding and varied.
I dare anyone to compare the sound in WoW to another MMO and not come out saying it's the best of the bunch in this department. I love good sound in a game, and there is really no contest here.
Total score 33, Rating - 3.3 / 10
But you played to 60, right? And played on a bunch of different servers, PvP and RP and otherwise, right?
The average playtime of a level 60 character is about 21 days. And you had a bunch of alts.
I just don't get how a game that bad would interest you up to level 60. If I don't like a game, I stop playing it after a couple hours tops.
If you don't like it, that's fine... to each his own. But I am REALLY tired of people who do or supposedly do have high level characters in ANY MMO coming back later and then talking about how awful the game is. How can you not recommend a game that gave you enough enjoyment to put that kind of time into a character?
Regarding the community..The Horde is generally ALOT worse when it comes to immature kids. Don't ask me why but it is true. Alliance you still see some stupid comments and misc. but the horde is alot worse.
Maturity is on a per-server basis. It is highly unlikely that either side has more "jackasses" or immature players than the other. In the end, I'm sure it all evens out although it may seem leaning towards one or anotehr side on any given realm.
Well, first off. I have to agree on the per server basis on levels of maturity. I played on a few servers myself and oddly enough, found the Horde to be more mature then the Alliance. But I've also heard of horror stories about Horde on other servers too. It' simply a reflection of society I guess.
Over all, I say it was a rather accurate review. Though I have to agree with some that the 1 Score was rather harsh. It wasn' all that bad to me. The graphics were really cartoony though. They looked good for what they were, but it didn't really help me personaly with the immersion. I think the only thing that helped me immerse myself in the game was the rich history. The Warcraft series has so much to it that I found myself killing time simply by going to go visit the places I had read about or heard about or only got a top-down view of in the games. That made it very interesting to me. Sound? I have no clue, first thing I normaly do is turn that off and crank up some mp3's.
Elsewhere someone had mentioned the gameplay and wondered about its rating or how it was. Honestly, I liked it. It was very simplistic and the open-source nature Blizz gave to the community left a player with MANY options on how to modify their interface. Which can drasticaly change how you can play. Though, sometimes it gets annoying the fact that sometimes you HAVE to have a particular addon in order to party with people more efficiently. But then again, I'm just very paranoid about what I put onto my games. Everything is or can be broken down into a manner most fitting their character, though sometimes bringing up all the bars can flood your screen with buttons, there's still shortcuts to get even to those. Interacting with your environment is preety good. But it wouldn't hurt to add some more emotion or movement to the characters. As the OP said, "slash, slash, slash, slash" all looks the same. Not to mention the spell and ability animations aren't very diverse. IMHO. It gets kinda boring. Still not bad to start from, but there are plenty of mods you can download to make your WoW playing experience more familiar or manageable.
Aside from that, I wouldn't say it was a horrible game but I wasn't very impressed. I too played many characters on many servers. Though most only hit the 40's. By that point I was bored with the grinding and the people. But that is just my personal opinion. I did hear plenty of 60's complaining about how bored they were, but I'm not sure how that worked. There are plenty of things to do and PvP is ALWAYS an option. Though the manatony of getting to 60 in the first place can sometimes be very discouraging. As for the balance of toons, I didn't like it very much, but I played mostly squishies. It always fealt like every other class had something to stop me dead in my tracks and there was nothing I could do. Ganking is a part of any PvP server(or game for that matter) but can get annoying when 60's go out of their way to harass you. Final score, I'd say 5.5-6. Not the best game in the world, but definately not the worst I've ever played. If you're a huge fan of the Warcraft world, you might want to give it a try. If not, try the free trial, get a feel for it, then go from there probably. (Credentials purposefuly omitted.)
You made the exact same post here:
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion.cfm/load/forums/loadforum/51/loadthread/64388/setstart/1/loadclass/35
..muppet.
Did we play the same game? For that matter, what other types of areas were looking for? There's snowy lands, forests, swamps, deserts, burned and blasted areas... pretty much the same as anywhere in the real world.
I also notice you never mentioned instances and the areas you find there, which is an odd omission since they're probably the most important areas of the game. They have a pretty wide variety of scenarios there, some with some pretty outstanding artwork.
Cartoonish and pixelated?
http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/439/auberdine6dv.jpg
That's a screenshot I took at the resolution I play at. The atmosphere in many areas of the game is outstanding. If you're missing shadows and such, you have something turned off.
I dont have anything turned off. Fact is the graphics are poor. And turning up all the settings does nothing. I do give it credit for having some detail like cobwebs in trees, etc but overall the game looks mid 1990's to me.
There arent any vendors you can use to sell your own goods. And since there isnt any housing, one cant set up a shop or mall either. The AH or spamming is pretty much the only way to sell stuff.
...and what's wrong with that? The auction houses work better to sell things and are easier to use than any other setup I've run into in an MMO. Things are set up this way because it's simple and easy and accessible, not to mention more fun than running all over the place trying to find what you want like in the bazaar of EQ or the housing merchants of DaoC.
The AH is a bad system. First off, the thing 50% the time doesnt work or is lagging badly. Second, 24 hr max for posting items is simply not enough time. And the cost is ridiculous. I hate posting a lvl 42 sword for 5g and it costs me 80s for a 24hr posting. I end up selling everything to npcs because I know the odds are good it wont sell.
The system in SWG was far far superior to this. Blizzard should have copied that system as it's the best ever designed. I should have my own npc vendors I can hire (cheaply) and use them to create my own business selling my own products. And wouldnt it be nice as a buyer to know that so and so's vendor down by the lake in wetlands always has mageweave in stock ?
No decay means tons of peeps will simply never ever need your goods. Also since WoW allows multiple toons per server peeps simply will take their lvl 60 toon and farm a low lvl instance for gear for the next toon they make. Many times I ran across a lvl 10 rogue who already had gear in his bank for every level. Again, lack of relying on others (a staple of most mmorpgs) is the glaring issue here.
Items bind when equipped; once you put it on, it can't be traded. Crafters are highly valued at higher levels, and many extremely good items require a high skill (and can be sold for lots of money). There are a LOT of people playing in any case; you can sell things of any level and make money if you do it at a reasonable price.
Incorrect, Nobody one year+ since launch needs another lvl 22 sword when 5 billion of them exist on the server. And yeah there are a lot of people playing....their alts. And those alts are more than taken care of by the player's main toon used to solo DM, Stockades, and SM for everything they could possibly need. 1-2 toons per server would fix this issue.
4. Community - What can I say to some up WoW's community...hmm. Well worst mmorpg community comes quickly to mind. I have never in any mmorpg seen such an awful foul-mouthed community of children ever. If they arent discussing their mating rituals or getting drunk, they're arguing about something ridiculous. I cant recall how many thousands of times Ive seen some poor fella ask a simple quest like where is something and bam major flame war breaks out. Just try selling some item and watch out because 50+ peeps will give their opinion on whether your price is fair.
Most of the players in WoW seemingly are NOT mmorpg vets. They have little clue on how to act, conduct themselves, nor play their class properly. Many times Ive seen warriors with no shields trying to play the rogue. Or watched in horror as a warlock ran into the middle of a mob and dropped an AOE on them (then swore at priest cause he died). Its a really lucky day if you actually find a decent group to run all the way through an instance.
Try Guild Wars.
Turn off General Chat.
Poof... problem solved. Yes, there are some wankers. It's not MOST, but some servers are certainly better than others. The only difference between this and other MMO's is the openness of the chat system; you can talk to entire areas more easily than most other games. It sucks because of losers like you mentioned, but it's great when looking for groups. There's a good side and a bad side to it; use /ignore and you'll notice how fast the system starts to work better.
LOL, so your answer is ignore chat ??? I play a mmorpg to be around other people. If I wanted no chat I'd play a rpg. And Guild Wars is about the same crowd as far as maturity goes. And ignore doesnt help at all when 80% of the chatter out there is idiotic. Many times Ive found myself in groups for instances with 2-3 of the 4 in group on my ignore list. I stand by my statement, worst mmorpg community ever.
Guilds are like nothing Ive ever seen in other mmorpgs. In other mmorpgs, joining a guild is an important step in playing the game. It usually involves a recommendation from another member. It might require joining them for an instance or group hunt to test out your skills. It could require tribute of goods or gold. Some even have websites that require filling out applications as well. In WoW its a completely different animal which is a reflection of the lack of maturity of the community. Peeps will invite players to join their guild without even talking to them first. Others will spam looking for others to sign their charter and arent required to join after (for some reason many just want to start a guild but dont care if anyone joins it ???)
I've bounced around in several guilds. Some disbanded. Others were maybe 5 players playing 30 toons (all alts) so nobody was ever on. Most are full of selfish players that rarely group together to benefit each other.
This is absolutely no different than any other game. There are drive-by invite guilds, and there are more close-knit friends in guilds. People spam about signing their charter because it requires 10 people to create the guild in the first place, and they'll worry about filling it once its made.
My experience with the guild system here is that it's exactly the same as every other MMO I've played.
Im not sure what games you've played but I can assure you this isnt the norm. Every mmorpg Ive played besides WoW had guilds that required more than "hey" to get you an invite. Simply not true what you're claiming. Again, this is merely a reflection of a really bad community with no clue on how a mmorpg works.
Some servers are designated as role playing. However very little RP goes on there. Again the maturity factor here really hurts. What WoW really needs is an Adults only server
Score - 1
I play on an RP server. There's roleplaying if you look for it, and there's not if you don't. Maturity is much higher on the RP servers when compared to most others, but don't mistake maturity for age; a lot of the wankers you're talking about are the same age as you and me, and aren't teenagers at all.
I tried 4 RP servers, maybe 5% of the players actually RP. And when they rp in general chat its usually followed by jokes and flames from others. From what I've gathered asking around, WoW's servers were down a lot or full so many of the kiddies joined RP servers just so they could get on and play. It creates a snowball effect because if nobody else is rping or getting flames for it or called "gay" then others who might rp are reluctant to do so.
5. PvP - Two major glaring issues with PvP in my opinion. One, its way too fast. There really isnt much time to bother with strategy. Its just mash buttons and hope you win. After experiencing SWG where one might spend 30 minutes battling a bounty hunter, this WoW PvP leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Second, the Honor system doesnt work. I played on several PvP severs, they were all the same....GANKFEST. Many times I had to log off in disgust because of the ganking that would occur. Dont get me wrong, I have no problem getting attacked by an enemy if I quest or explore in neutral or enemy territory. However, when I continually getting slain by a lvl 60 rogue and Im only 12, well thats just stupid. The Honor system is supposed to penalize someone into NOT attacking such lower level players.
My last night playing on a PvP server went like this....I was a lvl 14 paladin. I was in Westfall trying to quest. A swarm of horde were there doing some major griefing. They kept killing the quest giver I needed to turn in my quest for the pocketwatch and collecting oats. This horde literally just sat there and killed him anytime he spawned.
Other horde players camped the graveyard and would gank anyone reviving. Or they would camp the griphon so we couldnt fly out. Many stood in the entrance to DM so no alliance could approach to get in.
This went on for 5 days. Finally I gave up and moved on to a so-called Role-Playing server.
The last night you played on the PvP server they were ganking the quest giver, and it went on for 5 days. Which was it? The last night, or for 5 days?
Don't play on a PvP server. They're well known for being a gankfest; you'd know that by your experience in UO and other open-pvp games.
Again, it's odd that you talk about PvP but never even mention the battlegrounds. If you think there's no strategy to PvP, you've never done it and you've never fought in a battleground.
Yes there's some strategy but like I said, its too fast. There should be a higher damage multiplier in place for pvp so the fights last longer than 30 sec. And yes ganking does occurr in other mmorpgs. However the so-called "Honor System" was supposed to be the solution to prevent that. So my score is based on that....failed honor system.
Put in a system where if a lvl 60 attacks a lvl 1 they lose permanently one item they have equipped. That I guarantee would stop it. Or better yet, just make it not possible to attack someone 10+ lvl below you.
Score - 1
6. Animations / emotes - Combat animations really are quite awful in WoW. I get really bored watching my paladin doing the same slash over and over and over and over and over again. Oh wait, he just did a different slash for a critical hit, neat. Oh here we go again, slash over and over and over bleh. Emotes, like the community are simplistic and uninspiring. After seeing the same naked elf dance in IF a few thousand times you get tired of them. Absolutely the worst Ive ever seen in a mmorpg.
Score - 1
...again, did we play the same game? There are a lot of emotes, every race and gender has different ones, and they're fluid and generally well done.
You also use the worst class example in a paladin, where auto-attack is their core melee base. Pick a class that uses abilities often if you want something like that; every ability uses its own animation.
Again, you are mistaken. The emotes are simplistic and childish. Take a look at SWG, there were literally hundreds if not thousands of emotes. No comparison at all. Watching an elf do the same 3 moves over and over doesnt make me wanna hang out and RP with them.
As far as combat goes, you blame me for my choice in pally ? Ive played other toons you know, not any difference there. Simplistic and boring.
7. Game Economy - In short, a total mess. Because of the 5+ million players, gold farmers have set up shop in the game. Prices have skyrocketed since launch day. And because prices for items have gotten so high, many players are almost forced to buy gold from the very source of the problem (how ironic) Its quite common to see a blue item sword with average dps selling for 150g ouch. At launch even epics didnt go above 100g, now they sell for 2000g.
Yes, the economy is fairly messed up... but the little secret of those high priced blues and purples is that you don't have to buy them. Go get them yourself; you'll get better items doing the instances you never mentioned than buying items you don't want or can't afford from the AH you don't like.
Sure one can go and farm instances and hope they get lucky on that 0.0001% drop rate and hope the other members of group dont get it. Other items like low level stuff (copper bars) are far too expensive for new players to afford. So when a player spams you "selling WoW gold - 100g for $8 you're going to probably do it (especially if your a kid and could care less about ramifications of action).
8. Sound - Basically non-existent. Besides the music you hear upon entering SW or the occasional grunt while swing your sword, its just silent. If you crank the volume you might notice your mail armor making a clinking sound while you walk. Otherwise, its obvious Blizzard cared very little for doing anything innovative here.
Score - 1
Wow man... just wow. You're really just making this up now.
Go stand on the boat once. You hear the echo of wood from the planks below, the creak of the masts in the wind and the sound of the surf. The music is outstanding and varied.
I dare anyone to compare the sound in WoW to another MMO and not come out saying it's the best of the bunch in this department. I love good sound in a game, and there is really no contest here.
The sound stinks, Im sorry but it does. Hearing a grunt or water splashing doesnt make for great sound. I want to hear something like the Conan theme song when I charge into battle. I should get pumped up for combat from the music. When I enter a cave there should be some forboding music letting me know trouble is ahead. I should hear music when I enter an Inn. Thats what I consider "sound" and it simply does NOT exist in this game.
Total score 33, Rating - 3.3 / 10
But you played to 60, right? And played on a bunch of different servers, PvP and RP and otherwise, right?
The average playtime of a level 60 character is about 21 days. And you had a bunch of alts.
I just don't get how a game that bad would interest you up to level 60. If I don't like a game, I stop playing it after a couple hours tops.
If you don't like it, that's fine... to each his own. But I am REALLY tired of people who do or supposedly do have high level characters in ANY MMO coming back later and then talking about how awful the game is. How can you not recommend a game that gave you enough enjoyment to put that kind of time into a character?
I play a game for a while to determine if I like it. There are many mmorpgs out there that stink at the early stages. Or certain classes give a bad impression. I therefore tend to give a game a good look before I decide if its worthy of my time. WoW simply isnt that good.
Did we play the same game? For that matter, what other types of areas were looking for? There's snowy lands, forests, swamps, deserts, burned and blasted areas... pretty much the same as anywhere in the real world.
I also notice you never mentioned instances and the areas you find there, which is an odd omission since they're probably the most important areas of the game. They have a pretty wide variety of scenarios there, some with some pretty outstanding artwork.
Cartoonish and pixelated?
http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/439/auberdine6dv.jpg
That's a screenshot I took at the resolution I play at. The atmosphere in many areas of the game is outstanding. If you're missing shadows and such, you have something turned off.
I dont have anything turned off. Fact is the graphics are poor. And turning up all the settings does nothing. I do give it credit for having some detail like cobwebs in trees, etc but overall the game looks mid 1990's to me.
There arent any vendors you can use to sell your own goods. And since there isnt any housing, one cant set up a shop or mall either. The AH or spamming is pretty much the only way to sell stuff.
...and what's wrong with that? The auction houses work better to sell things and are easier to use than any other setup I've run into in an MMO. Things are set up this way because it's simple and easy and accessible, not to mention more fun than running all over the place trying to find what you want like in the bazaar of EQ or the housing merchants of DaoC.
The AH is a bad system. First off, the thing 50% the time doesnt work or is lagging badly. Second, 24 hr max for posting items is simply not enough time. And the cost is ridiculous. I hate posting a lvl 42 sword for 5g and it costs me 80s for a 24hr posting. I end up selling everything to npcs because I know the odds are good it wont sell.
The system in SWG was far far superior to this. Blizzard should have copied that system as it's the best ever designed. I should have my own npc vendors I can hire (cheaply) and use them to create my own business selling my own products. And wouldnt it be nice as a buyer to know that so and so's vendor down by the lake in wetlands always has mageweave in stock ?
No decay means tons of peeps will simply never ever need your goods. Also since WoW allows multiple toons per server peeps simply will take their lvl 60 toon and farm a low lvl instance for gear for the next toon they make. Many times I ran across a lvl 10 rogue who already had gear in his bank for every level. Again, lack of relying on others (a staple of most mmorpgs) is the glaring issue here.
Items bind when equipped; once you put it on, it can't be traded. Crafters are highly valued at higher levels, and many extremely good items require a high skill (and can be sold for lots of money). There are a LOT of people playing in any case; you can sell things of any level and make money if you do it at a reasonable price.
Incorrect, Nobody one year+ since launch needs another lvl 22 sword when 5 billion of them exist on the server. And yeah there are a lot of people playing....their alts. And those alts are more than taken care of by the player's main toon used to solo DM, Stockades, and SM for everything they could possibly need. 1-2 toons per server would fix this issue.
4. Community - What can I say to some up WoW's community...hmm. Well worst mmorpg community comes quickly to mind. I have never in any mmorpg seen such an awful foul-mouthed community of children ever. If they arent discussing their mating rituals or getting drunk, they're arguing about something ridiculous. I cant recall how many thousands of times Ive seen some poor fella ask a simple quest like where is something and bam major flame war breaks out. Just try selling some item and watch out because 50+ peeps will give their opinion on whether your price is fair.
Most of the players in WoW seemingly are NOT mmorpg vets. They have little clue on how to act, conduct themselves, nor play their class properly. Many times Ive seen warriors with no shields trying to play the rogue. Or watched in horror as a warlock ran into the middle of a mob and dropped an AOE on them (then swore at priest cause he died). Its a really lucky day if you actually find a decent group to run all the way through an instance.
Try Guild Wars.
Turn off General Chat.
Poof... problem solved. Yes, there are some wankers. It's not MOST, but some servers are certainly better than others. The only difference between this and other MMO's is the openness of the chat system; you can talk to entire areas more easily than most other games. It sucks because of losers like you mentioned, but it's great when looking for groups. There's a good side and a bad side to it; use /ignore and you'll notice how fast the system starts to work better.
LOL, so your answer is ignore chat ??? I play a mmorpg to be around other people. If I wanted no chat I'd play a rpg. And Guild Wars is about the same crowd as far as maturity goes. And ignore doesnt help at all when 80% of the chatter out there is idiotic. Many times Ive found myself in groups for instances with 2-3 of the 4 in group on my ignore list. I stand by my statement, worst mmorpg community ever.
Guilds are like nothing Ive ever seen in other mmorpgs. In other mmorpgs, joining a guild is an important step in playing the game. It usually involves a recommendation from another member. It might require joining them for an instance or group hunt to test out your skills. It could require tribute of goods or gold. Some even have websites that require filling out applications as well. In WoW its a completely different animal which is a reflection of the lack of maturity of the community. Peeps will invite players to join their guild without even talking to them first. Others will spam looking for others to sign their charter and arent required to join after (for some reason many just want to start a guild but dont care if anyone joins it ???)
I've bounced around in several guilds. Some disbanded. Others were maybe 5 players playing 30 toons (all alts) so nobody was ever on. Most are full of selfish players that rarely group together to benefit each other.
This is absolutely no different than any other game. There are drive-by invite guilds, and there are more close-knit friends in guilds. People spam about signing their charter because it requires 10 people to create the guild in the first place, and they'll worry about filling it once its made.
My experience with the guild system here is that it's exactly the same as every other MMO I've played.
Im not sure what games you've played but I can assure you this isnt the norm. Every mmorpg Ive played besides WoW had guilds that required more than "hey" to get you an invite. Simply not true what you're claiming. Again, this is merely a reflection of a really bad community with no clue on how a mmorpg works.
Some servers are designated as role playing. However very little RP goes on there. Again the maturity factor here really hurts. What WoW really needs is an Adults only server
Score - 1
I play on an RP server. There's roleplaying if you look for it, and there's not if you don't. Maturity is much higher on the RP servers when compared to most others, but don't mistake maturity for age; a lot of the wankers you're talking about are the same age as you and me, and aren't teenagers at all.
I tried 4 RP servers, maybe 5% of the players actually RP. And when they rp in general chat its usually followed by jokes and flames from others. From what I've gathered asking around, WoW's servers were down a lot or full so many of the kiddies joined RP servers just so they could get on and play. It creates a snowball effect because if nobody else is rping or getting flames for it or called "gay" then others who might rp are reluctant to do so.
5. PvP - Two major glaring issues with PvP in my opinion. One, its way too fast. There really isnt much time to bother with strategy. Its just mash buttons and hope you win. After experiencing SWG where one might spend 30 minutes battling a bounty hunter, this WoW PvP leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Second, the Honor system doesnt work. I played on several PvP severs, they were all the same....GANKFEST. Many times I had to log off in disgust because of the ganking that would occur. Dont get me wrong, I have no problem getting attacked by an enemy if I quest or explore in neutral or enemy territory. However, when I continually getting slain by a lvl 60 rogue and Im only 12, well thats just stupid. The Honor system is supposed to penalize someone into NOT attacking such lower level players.
My last night playing on a PvP server went like this....I was a lvl 14 paladin. I was in Westfall trying to quest. A swarm of horde were there doing some major griefing. They kept killing the quest giver I needed to turn in my quest for the pocketwatch and collecting oats. This horde literally just sat there and killed him anytime he spawned.
Other horde players camped the graveyard and would gank anyone reviving. Or they would camp the griphon so we couldnt fly out. Many stood in the entrance to DM so no alliance could approach to get in.
This went on for 5 days. Finally I gave up and moved on to a so-called Role-Playing server.
The last night you played on the PvP server they were ganking the quest giver, and it went on for 5 days. Which was it? The last night, or for 5 days?
Don't play on a PvP server. They're well known for being a gankfest; you'd know that by your experience in UO and other open-pvp games.
Again, it's odd that you talk about PvP but never even mention the battlegrounds. If you think there's no strategy to PvP, you've never done it and you've never fought in a battleground.
Yes there's some strategy but like I said, its too fast. There should be a higher damage multiplier in place for pvp so the fights last longer than 30 sec. And yes ganking does occurr in other mmorpgs. However the so-called "Honor System" was supposed to be the solution to prevent that. So my score is based on that....failed honor system.
Put in a system where if a lvl 60 attacks a lvl 1 they lose permanently one item they have equipped. That I guarantee would stop it. Or better yet, just make it not possible to attack someone 10+ lvl below you.
Score - 1
6. Animations / emotes - Combat animations really are quite awful in WoW. I get really bored watching my paladin doing the same slash over and over and over and over and over again. Oh wait, he just did a different slash for a critical hit, neat. Oh here we go again, slash over and over and over bleh. Emotes, like the community are simplistic and uninspiring. After seeing the same naked elf dance in IF a few thousand times you get tired of them. Absolutely the worst Ive ever seen in a mmorpg.
Score - 1
...again, did we play the same game? There are a lot of emotes, every race and gender has different ones, and they're fluid and generally well done.
You also use the worst class example in a paladin, where auto-attack is their core melee base. Pick a class that uses abilities often if you want something like that; every ability uses its own animation.
Again, you are mistaken. The emotes are simplistic and childish. Take a look at SWG, there were literally hundreds if not thousands of emotes. No comparison at all. Watching an elf do the same 3 moves over and over doesnt make me wanna hang out and RP with them.
As far as combat goes, you blame me for my choice in pally ? Ive played other toons you know, not any difference there. Simplistic and boring.
7. Game Economy - In short, a total mess. Because of the 5+ million players, gold farmers have set up shop in the game. Prices have skyrocketed since launch day. And because prices for items have gotten so high, many players are almost forced to buy gold from the very source of the problem (how ironic) Its quite common to see a blue item sword with average dps selling for 150g ouch. At launch even epics didnt go above 100g, now they sell for 2000g.
Yes, the economy is fairly messed up... but the little secret of those high priced blues and purples is that you don't have to buy them. Go get them yourself; you'll get better items doing the instances you never mentioned than buying items you don't want or can't afford from the AH you don't like.
Sure one can go and farm instances and hope they get lucky on that 0.0001% drop rate and hope the other members of group dont get it. Other items like low level stuff (copper bars) are far too expensive for new players to afford. So when a player spams you "selling WoW gold - 100g for $8 you're going to probably do it (especially if your a kid and could care less about ramifications of action).
8. Sound - Basically non-existent. Besides the music you hear upon entering SW or the occasional grunt while swing your sword, its just silent. If you crank the volume you might notice your mail armor making a clinking sound while you walk. Otherwise, its obvious Blizzard cared very little for doing anything innovative here.
Score - 1
Wow man... just wow. You're really just making this up now.
Go stand on the boat once. You hear the echo of wood from the planks below, the creak of the masts in the wind and the sound of the surf. The music is outstanding and varied.
I dare anyone to compare the sound in WoW to another MMO and not come out saying it's the best of the bunch in this department. I love good sound in a game, and there is really no contest here.
The sound stinks, Im sorry but it does. Hearing a grunt or water splashing doesnt make for great sound. I want to hear something like the Conan theme song when I charge into battle. I should get pumped up for combat from the music. When I enter a cave there should be some forboding music letting me know trouble is ahead. I should hear music when I enter an Inn. Thats what I consider "sound" and it simply does NOT exist in this game.
Total score 33, Rating - 3.3 / 10
But you played to 60, right? And played on a bunch of different servers, PvP and RP and otherwise, right?
The average playtime of a level 60 character is about 21 days. And you had a bunch of alts.
I just don't get how a game that bad would interest you up to level 60. If I don't like a game, I stop playing it after a couple hours tops.
If you don't like it, that's fine... to each his own. But I am REALLY tired of people who do or supposedly do have high level characters in ANY MMO coming back later and then talking about how awful the game is. How can you not recommend a game that gave you enough enjoyment to put that kind of time into a character?
I play a game for a while to determine if I like it. There are many mmorpgs out there that stink at the early stages. Or certain classes give a bad impression. I therefore tend to give a game a good look before I decide if its worthy of my time. WoW simply isnt that good.
It certainly isnt a below average game either, leaving your rating to be a load of crap. So did you play to 60 or not? Have you played to 40? Not that it matters if you did or not, the ratings are way off.
Seriously you give it a bunch of 1's then toss in some token good scores at the end to make people think you werent being biased,lol.
Interesting review, admriker444.
I agree with some of your points, like Community and PvP.
Though, I don't think you give the graphic enough credit. Yes you are right, that from a technical stand point, WoW is very ugly, but from an artistic stand point and as far as art direction goes, it looks wonderful, fresh and different. Like a cartoon.
Also I didn't thought the quests were that good. To me, it was more of the same. Copy/pasted bland NPCs with nothing interesting to say, no voice acting, no involving story, no personallity, just little "kill 10 of these" and "collect 20 of that" all the way to lvl 60.
I stopped reading after seeing so many 1's. LOL it's not because something is bad that you need to put 1's on it. 1 means it's the worst of the worst.
1- Graphics : You give a 4 based on what ? These graphics are Warcraft like, they are fine for that game. It would'nt be World of Warcraft if the graphics we're like EQ2. I give WOW graphics a 8.
2- Combat : Once again i find your score too low. It's not perfect but it doesnt deserve a 5, i give combat in general a score of 8.
3- Crafting : For once i agree with you, crafting is a joke in WOW. When you have played game like EQ2 or Anarchy Online, you know what real crafting is. I agree with your score of 4.
4- Community : Yes i agree with you it's bad. And your comments about WOW players not being MMORPG vets is funny. How do you expect a game with 5 Millions players to be filled with a majority of vets ? The community is bad yes, but not to the point of giving it a 1. My score for the community is 5
5- PVP : First i'm not a PVP fan but i did a little bit of it when i was playing along with some raids. It's not the best BUT it's not not the worst either. Giving it a 1 again is ridiculous. My score for PVP is 6.
6- Animation/Emote : I don't understand your comment here. What do you expect your paladin to do when using his sword ? Make a dance between each throw ? Give me a break, have you played something else but Paladins ? Giving this a 1 is a joke. My score : 7
7- Game Economy : Depends on what server you are, i tried a few and i noticed some major difference. Maybe you were unlucky on your server, i never had any problem find good stuff at an OK price on my. Once again you give 1 which is way too low. My score is : 5
8- Sound : It's not the best sound but once again FAR from deserving a 1. My score : 6
9 - Immersive factor : When you have 5M players after 1 year, what else can you say, they deserve the highest scrore on that : I give them 10
10- Quest : I doN't agree with you on quests, that's weird eh. Quests are fun i agree but they often get repetitive and at some stage in the game (i rememeber between 45-55) i had very few quests to do. I give a score of 7 on the quest section.
So my score for WOW is : 70% and i think it's a fairly accurate score.
Having played WoW for over a year,I'd have to agree with Aguitha's take on the game score wise,I think you are bang on.WoW was a game I really enjoyed at least till I hit 60,then it took a dive quickly.
But the amount of 1's in admriker444's review just does not reflect what I saw in this game and I've been playing RPG's online and otherwise for 20+ years.
Not to mention the 5 million players this game has picked up,and I'm sure a number of them are also veteran gamers.
I am now hoping DAoC which I just started playing will capture some of the magic WoW had for the first 60 levels(so far so good).
I can understand not liking the artistic style. I still think it's absurd to say the graphics are bad, or mid-90's in quality.
There aren't houses. For the way the game is set up, the system for buying and selling equipment works exceptionally well; if you can use E-Bay, you can use the AH in this game.
And I'll respectfully disagree that the system in SWG was better. It was clunky and cluttered, and much more difficult to differentiate items in general. I also absolutely hate having to run to someone's house or vendor to go shopping for an item in a video game.
Anything worth selling sells in less than 8 hours. If it doesn't sell in 8, it won't sell in 24; don't use the more expensive methods. Or use the trade channel.
I play on an overpopulated server, and haven't had problems with the AH since I came back to the game in October. Your gripe was valid when I quit the first time almost a year ago, though. Have you played since then? In any case, it's not down 50% of the time, and the cost is nowhere near as high as you portray it to be.
WoW was release in November of last year and is still in the top 5 every month on the game sales chart. There are loads of new players coming in every month. Everyone's alt needs gear, too, since you can't pass it down.
Demand for those items is high, which is part of why they sell for so much anymore. Besides, I do have a 60 character; I CAN farm instances to get low level loot, but I won't when I can just have someone make it or buy it on the AH. I'm not going to spend hours farming grays to get a drop I can use with a character who won't even need it that long.
General chat serves no purpose other than general chatter. If you hate it so much, turn it off; it won't affect your ability to play at all, and it won't affect your ability to socialize at all, and it won't affect your ability to get a group at all, or to trade items...
You find yourself in groups with 2-3 of the people on your ignore list? "Many" times?
I find that extremely hard to believe. I have a short tolerance for idiots, and I have 6 people on my ignore list from the last year.
I read your "resume" you posted. I've played every game you listed on it and some. And it is absolutely true, as I'm sure almost everyone else here can attest to that has played multiple MMO's.
You tried every RP server. Why do you change servers so much? You played every RP server, PvP servers, and so on, and you had a level 60 character somewhere. You sure played a lot for a game you hated.
Anyway, yes, people don't RP in general chat. It's a full zone spatial chat... it's not really meant for roleplaying. No, most don't roleplay, but I still don't think that matters much; and it's still no different than any other MMO I've played, where I usually play on an RP server.
And I still think it's laughable that you judge the entire population of WoW by the General Chat channel.
I can't speak for the honor system on a PvP server since I don't play there, but it's fine on the PvE servers.
Incidentally, you don't get honor for killing someone gray to you.
Defeats the purpose of an open PvP server. And the item loss would be easily exploitable by griefers, compounded by the fact that a lot of items aren't replaceable if lost.
I played SWG, and I disagree with you. I played EQ2 as well; the emotes are done very well in that game, better than SWG. 90% of them never get used, because there's no real point to them.
We'll agree to disagree, but considering some of the well known animation issues in SWG I think it's a bad example to have picked.
I didn't blame you for anything. If you don't like auto-attack, don't pick a class that relies on it for every melee attack they make and then complain afterward that that's all they do.
They are the only class with that issue, by the way. Every other class has more active combat abilities.
Go mine your own copper, it's plentiful. You can be a successful artisan and never buy materials from the AH.
Going into dungeons and looking for the item with the low drop rate is called playing the game. Every MMO with loot drops has been that way; WoW gives a decent alternative to solo players by having quest loot be usable. Some quest rewards are better than what drops in the dungeon too, like the Westfall items alliance-side for killing Van Cleef in the Deadmines. And you don't have to roll on them.
Yes, it does. There's mood music that starts with every scripted boss fight in every single instance dungeon in the game, as well as most of the sub events inside them as well. I get the impression that you never entered a dungeon.
You can set the music to loop in the options menu if you want it to be present all the time.
You play a game for DAYS of playtime to find out whether or not you even like it? You play an MMO for a longer period than it takes to beat any single player game in existence, and then decide it's not worth your time?
If you don't like it, then that's fine; everybody has their own opinions. I won't argue with opinion... when they're given honestly and fairly. You've done neither.
Here is my review in a nutshell.
Graphics 8
Combat 8
Crafting 5
Community 3
PvP 6
Animations 7
Game Eco 6
Sound 8
Immersive Factor 9
Quests 9
Score: 70 out 100
the IP is a lier plain and simple, and here is why.
1, im am simply tired of people calling the graphics in WoW cartoony like its a bad thing PLAY A WARCRAFT game for christs sake you will notice in all 3 of the games the graphics have a cartoon feel to them, and so does wow go figure
2,LOL the "combat is to slow".....since youv played a palliden fight a druid once and a while a smart one will give you a nice 5 minute fight(my favorite as a matter of fact). you cant expect pure offensive classes to have long fights when they have no ways to gain back health short of potions. what you are asking for is simply dumb
3, crafting in WoW is in no way shape or form useless and or pointless, i fing it extremely funny you point out alchemy HA its one of the most profitable proffs excluding 2 gathering ones. and yes anyone can make an alt to create and or farm things but let me compare this to the real world, any1 can grow their own food except for people that dont have the space(people in wow who dont have the time) but guess what people still buy food because you are paying for convienance. its how the world works.
4, the community varies so much between servers and you may get yelled at for asking noobish questions, but what do you expect when alot of them can be asnwered by reading the damn manual. to and you complain about people complaining about you selling stuff for too high yet you complain about the same thing.... typing that doesnt even make sence just like you
5, well here is where you give yourself out as a lier..... westfall is a allience territory the horde cant TOUCH you if you dont touch them and yes i play on a pvp server and i have a 60 hunter on it. the fact that the horde killed your quest giver that many times they would get enough DK's to take their rank back to private..... i just dont beleive you in this catagory, but then again i know your lieing so what can i expect.
6, the animations/emotes are very good actaully, they fit in with the look of the game. likeing them or not liking them is simply a matter of opinon but they do serve the game well that cannot be denyed but im sure you will.
7, ok here is another spot where your post is broken you say any1 can farm for items yet their price goes up....hmmm that just doesnt seem right to me, o wait every1 doesnt go farm their own items so the demand goes up and so does the price. and just so you know its buying gold that makes prices go up, when someone offers you 1000g for something instead of the regular 100 are you still gonna sell it for 100? its people that buy gold and dont know the true value of it that screw up game economys in any game
8, wow just wow thats all i can say when i read what you write in this catagory....did you have your speakers off or are you possibly deaf. the sounds is evrywhere you go from scores of music in dungeons to aumbiant fast tempoed music in caves the music is everywhere in the game, turn on your damn speakers and listen.
9, i believe this is the only part you got right even though its just a broad generalization just like the rest of your post but o well.
10, and yet again something that is generalized by many many 3 times a many people.
in "conclusion" you have not reviewed this game at all you just took every trolls post and combined and added some "credintials" to it. i mean come on ANY1 who has played the game can tell you are lieing, give it a rest please.
and if there are any spelling/and or grammer errors dont blame me its a long post that i will not read twice
im not over powered! look it took me 10 minutes to kill that guy
I would concur with a lot of the OP's points, especially the comments about the community. First, my background with MMORPGs:
DAOC -- 3 years
AC1 -- since retail launch, with about one year's downtime sporadically
AC2 -- wasted a few months; of all the games I've played, I actually feel like this was the only true "waste of time" I've run into.
Horizons -- 5 months. Fantastic crafting. Mediocre to horrible everything else.
EQ1 -- since Beta
EQ2 -- six months; back twice to "see what's changed"
Shadowbane -- six months
SWG -- one year.
WoW -- Beta; retail launch through May; returned for two months August-September; returned in December.
UO -- retail launch, sporadically since.
Current active subscriptions: AC1
To-wit:
Sound -- EQ1's swamps had better "atmospheric sound" than anything or anyplace in WoW. I'm not looking for music, as the OP is; I'm looking to be immersed by environmental sounds, like snow crunching, wind blowing, the sound of water as I move through a marsh, the sound of bugs in the marsh, etc. I would not call WoW the worst (disagree with a 1), but it is certainly not much above that. I'd give it a 3 out of 10.
Animations -- very limited. The combat animations are very interesting -- for the first few times you see them. Then, you realise that you've seen ALL the animations, and you're going to see the very limited set of animations over and over again. Not good. They need more breadth and variety in the animations. The Emotes are also lacking -- same thing. What is there is cool -- there just isn't enough of it. Dancing, for instance -- cool initially, but there needs to be multiple dancing techniques per sex/race (more of them).
Graphics -- totally subjective, not going to get into that. I think they achieve what the designers wanted to achieve. Whether you like them or not is up to you (and me). I do agree that turning the graphics "up" to max doesn't do remotely enough -- you turn up graphics in EQ2, you get very clear improvements. It's an oddity, but again, if you like the graphics, it won't make much difference.
Community -- literally the worst I've ever encountered, in any of the games above. Each time I come back, I do something simple: I start a new character. Why? Because it's a test to see if the community has improved at all. And each and every single time, I start out, within minutes I'm getting pounded with "duel me" over and over again, even when I say no, because these little brats have no manners whatsoever nor care about building a good gaming community; and there's always a few high-levels that run around taunting and shouting in the chat. And don't say "ignore" them, this is an MMORPG, for crying out loud, if I wanted to have to ignore so many people, I'd just play Morrowind. If you have to "ignore" people, it defeats the purpose and the point of playing an MMORPG. I listened to several guys chatting about how they'd figured out ways to "make" people turn on their PvP flags, by dancing around them and taunting them and so forth -- and the fact that these idiots are there in droves is why WoW has the worst community of all. A well-deserved "1".
Quests -- well-developed, nicely done (especially several of the Night-Elf area quests). However, I'd like to see some more dynamism to them. Perhaps a few quest-givers here and there that don't give out their quests to certain races (racism?); or a few that won't work with "magic users" because they distrust them; or an actual conversation tree that gives you choices. I hate that I spent most of my time longing for the ability to hit a button and skip through the quest text most of the time, because once you've read it, that's it. It never changes. I'd give it a qualified 7 -- 9 for the quests and the effort that went into them; and 5 for the lack of any real dynamism.
Game economy -- agree with the OP. It's wildly out of control. Ties into...
Crafting! -- very simplistic. You have no say in creating anything unique, or even try to make something unique. Your "copper sword" will be exactly like everyone else's. Your "big honking copper sword" will be exactly like everyone else who can make it. Sad. They need to take a lesson from Horizons here, where I can mix and match materials (not just "all copper", but mix say oak instead of bone for the handle and different materials for the blade), or mix and match dyes, or mix and match a large variety of small and large enchantments. They put in crafting -- they just made no effort to make it interesting or dynamic. It's an assembly line with no differentiation. I'd give it a 3. (the interface is easy to use; they do require you to have the appropriate equipment, which is a positive)
Now, some meta-comments: I think Blizzard achieved what they set out to achieve. I think they set out not to do anything dynamic or to introduce new concepts or ideas. I think they took existing ideas (crafting; quests; skills; etc.) and boiled them down to simplicity (netting them a nice 10 out of 10 for their interface, by the way). Their crafting is nothing special nor creative; their questing is slickly done and interesting but it doesn't even offer up the slightest "tree" of choices (you don't have conversations, you click on someone and they "give you" their spiel, period). Combat is mechanically identical to other games -- click buttons for special attacks, build combos by clicking buttons in a specific order. Again, nothing creative -- they put a very definite and impressive polish on the existing conventions. Why do this? Because it creates a game that will appeal to more people than MMORPGs had done before. This isn't meant to sound arrogant or anything like that, but by dumbing-down everything, and polishing all their mechanics, they create something very accessible. By writing well, they take a straightforward and very linear quest/conversation engine and make it interesting. WoW was built to be what it is: something that would appeal to all the Diablo2 fanatics, to all the videogame players, even to FPS players. It has little to offer longtime MMORPGers who are looking for... more. More in their crafting; more choices in their conversation engines; more detail in their graphics (i'll take stellar gameplay and so-so graphics over "I can see each blade of grass and the reflection in that spider's eyeballs!" anyday). The ability to differentiate yourself -- be it by crafting; by action; etc. A world that reflects some changes -- let's have an "elemental invasion" that actually burns down a village, and then, over the next month, have the village being rebuilt to its former glory. It's scripted, but it gives the impression of change -- and therefore dynamism.
For me, WoW is an excellent introductory MMORPG, a very polished product... but not the best at any category. And it *is* the worst community I've ever seen, in any of the games I've played (see above)... worst, and definitely most juvenile (yup, I wanna see nothing but a stream of invective in my chats -- sarcasm intended).
--- Forgot PvP: nothing special. DAOC did the Battlegrounds thing years earlier and far better. The "honor" system has no honor in it and fails because of it. All the PvP does is encourage the worst kinds of behavior instead of providing a means to fight each other and to introduce the kind of dynamic immersion that that offers. It's like they took all the bad from prior games threw out any mechanisms to limit that "bad". I wouldn't give it a 1, because the classes are pretty well balanced and the gameplay is very fluid, but it's probably a 3-4 for me. Nothing new, and nothing particularly well-done...
To the OP, don't agree with some of your scores but the the majority of your comments are very, very true.