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General: MMORPG.com E3 Awards
Dana
Member Posts: 2,415
It's time for our 2nd annual E3 Awards. Today, we chose winners across seven categories from what we saw on the floor. The awards include: Best of Show, Best Expansion, Most Innovative, Best Use of a License, Best Graphics, Best Booth and Most Surprising. Find out who took home the hardware!
 E3 2006 was held from May 10th to 12th in Los Angeles, California. MMORPG.com had its largest presence ever with eight full time writers on the floor, five of whom have worked on the development end of things. We saw a lot of new titles, evolving titles and games that already made it out the door. Friday, after the show, we debated and came up with a list of winners across seven categories.
Ultimately, the decision came down to an editorial decision, but it was not that simple. We argued, we voted, we voted again. The MMORPG industry has grown so large that no single person can be an expert on everything and while some disagree, I believe these choices are the consensus picks of our group. They are joined by honorable mentions for those games that also received a lot of consideration. |
You can read the whole thing here.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios
Comments
That's a pretty ignorant way of judging anything, let a lone a game.
I was suprised that MMORPG.com didn't give Vanguard even an honorable mention. In stark contrast to Stratics, a very reputable MMORPG site, giving them game of the show. I'll give them credit though, giving Gods and Heroes top game took some real cohones given the huge anti-SOE conspiracy geek population on these forums.
All in all very good Awards and well thought out, except the complete absence of my most anticipated game, Vanguard.
Am I the only one that noticed Vanguard didn't get a mention at all
I would wage that the staff at Africa are players of the RPG: 'Rêve de Dragon' (Dragon's Dream in a free translation, no idea what is the correct english name). This was the most imaginative RPG I saw so far.
Now I dunno who to curse, but AION caught my interest! 1 more game not yet release to check on it developpment as a potential place to call home, hey who wouldn't want to have angelics/demonics neighbors in a permanent war?
For Gods & Heroes, don't even try. It is nothing against SoE, it is their 'end-game' ideas, the idea of how important PvP is...although I don't want to argue that, it is just not for me.
To the guy crying for Vanguard: You realise AoC was neglected as well, despite the fact that MS ditch Vanguard for AoC, I think it is pretty safe to say AoC has a lot more, appeal.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
I must say that I think Age of Conan was slighted in some of the categories. IMHO, AoC was at least worth a mention in the 'Best Graphics' and 'Best use of a license category'.
However, we could argue these things forever, just wanted to get my opinion out there
-Chegg
For license... You're probably right, but it really wasn't one of the ones we actively debated. Honestly, Warhammer ran away with that category.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios
best graphics "Gods and Heroes", what do you see that I don't???
I'm mean we're talking graphics, not gameplay, innovation, community, etc... I haven't played any of them and we all know graphics don't make the game
having said that, in terms of graphics noone can hand it to SUN... let's be honest here... I'm mean artistically SUN or even AION is just a notch better than "Gods and Heroes" it's so obvious... I mean "Gods and Heroes" looks great, but I look at the trailer and it doesn't grab me, nice of course, but no x-factor... whereas everytime I check out one of those Korean games... (I just watched the trailors back to back)... well they just mesmerise you, they blow you away... "Gods and Heroes" does not do that
Glancing through the awards, I was amazed to see that Anarchy Online had won so many! Kudos to Funcom!
Hi! My name is paper. Nerf scissors, rock is fine.
MMORPG = Mostly Men Online Roleplaying Girls
http://www.MichaelLuckhardt.com
I, for one, am glad that there is no mention of Vanguard. Even before SOE, I was amazed at how a game could be hyped based only on a well known team and it's promises. really what award could it have won? Its not based on a license, the booth quality has nothing to do with game quality anyway, it's not an expansion pack, graphics ar not so fantastic (according to mmorpg.com review), and a game that wants to do EQ2 "right" can hardely be called "surprising" or "innovative" (class+level grind, that's a revolution). It could not win "best of the show" for anything.
I'm so sad that games continue to get away from the UO model and just dig deeper in the EQ grind thing...I've been waiting for just UO in decent 3D for 9 years
OK Vanguard didnt appear in any reward, but I (at least) expect some review from this game at E3 from you guys. Because of what I read about it in other places make me think that something is out of place here. Where is your answer to most important question of E3 about Vanguard and SOE, I have read it in others places, why not here?
By the way, Vangurad still will be my game, even more after of what I read.
One word ... ODD
Notice: The views expressed in this post are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of MMORPG.com or its management.
Now two things are corrupt here at MMORPG.com
1. The staff
2. The rating system
This site is nothing compared to Stratics, they at least know how to judge a MMO.
Total time played: 9125 Days, 21 Hours, 29 Minutes, 27 Seconds
Time played this level: 39 Days, 1 Hour, 24 Minutes, 5 Seconds
Total time played: 9125 Days, 21 Hours, 29 Minutes, 27 Seconds
Time played this level: 39 Days, 1 Hour, 24 Minutes, 5 Seconds
I'm honestly surprised not to see EverQuest II: Echoes of Faydwer mentioned on the Expansions honorable mentions, at the very least. There are more features and more content in that expansion than any of the others that were at the show. There's a partial feature list here:
http://everquest2.station.sony.com/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/
Also mentioned at the show were secondary tradeskills like Tinkering, guild emblems and such for customizing cloaks, a guild level cap increase (60), content for all players from 1 through 70, and some specific names of zones we'll see (Greater Faydark, Lesser Faydark, Steamfont, The Loping Plains, Castle Mistmoore).
Not just Darkfall but also Adellion and to a major extent Conan.
I wish Chronicles of Spellborn was even an honorable mention for something but there are a few heavy hiters out there.
What did surprise me is that neither Hero's Journey or Seed made honorable mention for most innovative. Africa covering African culture is great but it doesn't completely dwarf the whole rpgish nature of Seed (even if I find the execution of it to be flawed) or the personalization of Hero's Journey IMO. And the Dreamscape still hasn't been explained all that well beyond the repeated fact that it is an instance built in your character's mind.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios
Vanguard no doubt looked good and surprised me at being better than I thought. They took some good concepts from some other games and are making them better. That's great in my book. But, compared to some of the other things I saw at the show, I couldn't honestly put it above other games definitively. In fact as Dana said, we didn't all agree on picks and the competition was extremely close. Add on that there was no way to see every single game and it made it even more difficult because we had to rely on each other's impressions and debate based on that in comparison to others.
I think we made some very solid picks however no matter how flawed you may believe the process was. I know I personally tried to take a look at as many games as I could but there was nowhere near enough time to see everything.
Absolutely no game even interests me aside from WARHAMMER!!
I dunno... WoW's crappiness at lvl 60 just put me off for a long time from MMORPG's.. I mean.. I have been looking and trying other MMORPG's out.. but nothing seems... good..
Don't get me wrong.. WoW was GREAT .. until I hit lvl 60 and almost Grande Marshall in PVP rankings..
Honestly I thought I was gonna have to wait for STAR TREK: Online to come out to find anything that peeked my interest.. but then WARHAMMER kinda came out of nowhere..
And even if the game turns out to be crap (Please god let it be all I hope for) .. at least Paul Barnett or whatever his name is .. is TOTALLY ENTERTAINING enough just to listen to!! E3 movie interview thingy at gamespot!! He is hillarious.. and his video phone posts on the WARHAMMER website...
Ya... glad Warhammer won something... if they manage to do what they are trying... I'll finally find another game to play
Age of Conan should be best in show, from city building and siege warfare to mounted formation combat it has an abundance of ground up ideas that seem to encompass every aspect desired in an mmorpg.
I feel that Gods and Heroes is Guild Wars in Rome, 5 man arena style combat.
I understand why they didn't get best expantion tho I just dont agree with the reason. Its good that they are breaking it into 3. Its a huge addtion and it needs to be layed on the player base gently.
How ever I will voice one point here. Eve deserves a rereview when Kail is all done being deployed. A lot of other games get new reviews after major (and sometimes minor) expantions. EvE has gone from 2edGen to Castor to Cold war to Red Moon Rising to Bloodlines (All major all free) with out a revisit in over 3 years now.
As to booth, they had a great booth and I had special spot for it as it was in the same slot Wish once held, but really... the way NCSoft let real people talk to senior staff, their live entertainment, etc. It was hard to compete with.
For the expansion, it comes down to semantics. Yes, it is probably better for EVE to do what they're doing, but if we judge them on that, we might have to judge other games on their next three expansions as well. It opens a can of worms.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios