I knew I would be taking a chance - and I'm not blaming anyone but myself.
But, boy, this game is beyond terrible. The story and presentation is among the worst I've seen - and the UI/layout is so busy it literally hurts my eyes.
It's like a parody of a bad asian slot-machine dressed up as an MMO - and I'm honestly disgusted with how bad it is. The engine - at max settings - has the most massive amount of asset pop-ins I've ever seen. We're talking your screen is saturated in textures and meshes appearing and disappearing constantly with zero effort to hide it. This includes players and shadows.
It didn't exactly help discovering that the classes are gender-locked and that the only one I'm interested in is female-only (ranger).
That said, I could have done more research and not been so impulsive.
So, I kinda deserve it.
Anyway, back to being bored with the genre.
Comments
Therein lies your problem.
It's not more of the same. It's a large amount of a new kind of terrible.
But to each his own - and I'm happy that some people can enjoy it.
Tastes differ and all that.
I would think it pretty difficult to find enjoyment in something that bores me. I guess what I'm trying to say is that your boredom and dissatisfaction are borne out of unrealized expectations. If you play a game for what it is, instead of what you want or expect it to be, you may find the enjoyment you seek.
If I was going to rank the Asian games I've played, this would be at or near the back.
I'll copy in a few points from my earlier post, which unfortunately I'm still experiencing:
The glories of the character creator seem to be immediately lost once the actual game starts.
i don't know if it was purely down to lag, but the quest npc narratives seemed to be significantly out of sync with the text.
There also seemed to be a miscellaneous audio transcript from someone going on.
Character movement - autopathing - turning corners - and related camera movements:
My character turning corners looked like something out of Tron
Not benefiting at all from the reluctance of the camera to change angle.
Running up and down steps showed a remarkable levitation skill I didn't know my character possessed.
As well as the out of sync issues, the actual mechanics of npc interfacing came across as clunky, lacking any intuition.
I did quite a few keybinding adjustments - which I normally do being left handed - but despite showing that these had been successful, the new keys didn't operate with the correct skills. I did double/triple check and have been keybinding for years, so not sure what's going on with this.
One of the big draws was the visuals and while I could tolerate it, I don't think its going to be acceptable to most AAA comparisons until they clean things up instead of just "Adding" effects to objects without any real testing of an open scape as a whole visually (including forced drawing etc. all mentioned above).
I know another big draw people have said was the parkour, which I find annoying because the animations were all the same. Like hopping over a wall was what i'd call the animation style and it looped basically for any other jumping and scaling action. Just unrealistic and repeatitive animations almost instantly.
But my biggest concern is "but it's a sandbox" even AA has instanced dungeons throughout and PvE endgame or reasons to go back to dungeons. Without there being any dungeons really (saw a hidden open world dungeon area that seemed mediocre at best that was supposedly a secret area). Being a sandbox doesn't excuse for lack of PvE content, which is fine if its marketed as such and PvP GvG etc. but in NA they are definitely marketing it to the PvE aspects that exist and there isn't much.
Add in the crazy repeatitive quests, lack of PvE content and "instant access" PvP content, highly confusing and mediocre story, bugs like crazy, a sketchy updater/patcher and gender locks, huge lack of content from KR version, and buy2play I don't see it going over well, AND PROBABLY being the next AA, in huge hype huge let down. with the game overall, not to mention execution and handling by Daum. And with less than a month left until full release I see it coming in as a "DOA" product.
It seems like the West is REALLY aching for a good MMORPG to come out for the last 10 years with all your typical features, a good combat system, and dynamic sandboxy stuff. So everyone projects these wishes on the latest big MMO to come out every time. Problem is they follow the exact same themepark formula as previous MMOs.
So far Darkfall Online has come the closest to hardcore sandbox MMORPG, and doing it right. The first one mind you, not the second one. 10,000 players in one server with minimal lag (after launch), HUGE open world, great combat system that took years to master, a mix of FPS/TPS, ships/mounts, bank system, FFAPVP, karma system, subscription based, NOT P2W - you had to farm and grind all the good stuff by yourself, real alliances and wars formed by people without any help from the devs, and minimal questing with maximum player interaction. It really felt like a world created BY the players, except no worldbuilding. The only bad points where a pretty old-school inventory and meh graphics, although this didn't detract me at all since it actually felt like a real life world for the FIRST TIME since Ultima Online.
But yeah, back to BDO, logged into the beta today. Horrible asian themepark.
Eww, quest after quest. Typical kill 5 beetles and return to me. Graphics seemed better in Youtube videos, but still very nice. Great character creation. Horrible UI clutter. Graphics seemed nice. Some features seem very cool like workers/nodes but they are accessible only through menus upon menus.
Seriously, I am shocked the MMORPG genre has progressed so poorly.
We understand, hell that's why people still play Rift!
There's no reason not to voice your opinion if a MMO you disliked was bad in your experience. Readers gauge the kind of stuff you are into and decide whether to accept or discard your opinion.
The last thing we want is people spending their hard earned money on games they will later regret to have purchased. Better to give it to charity, or buy a new toy/playhouse for your pet or flowers/booze/weed for yourself or your spouse or anything, really.
Those that dropped $50-100 without watching people stream or reading up on the game deserve what they get.
Is/Was relatively cheap to try out Beta and full versions of the game if people weren't lucky to get one of the thousands of keys that seem to be raining from the sky.
CB1 $3, CB2 $0.77, KR $7.
Watching/Talking to streamers: Free.
To OP: Might be your machine or settings, but BDO KR runs very smooth (minus some ping/lag here and there) and the little I've been in CB1/2, haven't noticed anything crazy.
Edit- OP is a long time WoW player btw... "WoW's combat is unmatched" I hope this sheds some light....
it does have issues needless complexity to do random things is a big one, lot variety of options of things you can do poorly explained an laid out is another. i don't like the energy required to chat or use trade skill but hate gold farmers an bots for that, as is a very effective counter.
but for me it adds a some nice changes too a tired genre that can pave way for others too copy an make better versus another MMO trying to make WoW 2.0 .
the nice thing is it B2p so it yours even if you never spend a dime after it's bought. complain all you want about cash shop or their absurd high pricing but it never forced on you too be able play the game.
But I happen to think there's a massive potential for growth in the genre, and since I'm quite keen on sandbox elements and active combat - I guess I blinded myself to the obvious flaws of this game and just bought it on impulse.
As I said, my own fault - and there's no way around that.
However, I don't think my opinion is any less valid because it might annoy those who don't agree with it.
If you think the genre is in a great place and Black Desert adds to it in a significant way, then I suggest you simply enjoy the game and ignore annoying people like myself
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
But there is one huge thing missing from this game that EVERY other game has... gold spammers!
I do agree about story presentation, NPCs saying one thing (over and over sometimes) while the text says something else and the annoying black mist (shut up about your teeth already!) but despite that, I'm enjoying it now.
And the cash shop... once I found out that pets are family-wide and not character specific that took some of the sting out of it since I find them an essential convenience for looting.
I'm trying it out with a free CB2 key so buyer's remorse isn't a thing for me. I might actually plunk down the $30 and buy it. I thought I wouldn't after the first day... /shrug.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED