Ugh. This is it?!?!

This is Bioware/Mythic’s big announcement?

A new Skaven race (that you can’t even level from level one!) and an increase of the Renown cap to 100 from 80?

That’s it?!?!

Before you say it, yes I know we don’t have all the details yet but, come on, this is a big letdown.  No matter how you fancy it up, a single race and renown cap raise is not enough to keep people interested in WAR.  WAR needed some big news this week, something to keep people interested.  Something to give people hope that there was actually new content coming.

Instead we get this??

Oh, and I love this quote:

With the RvR pack Bioware Mythic wants to move away from the standard “Release a huge expansion every 2 years.” system and wants to adopt a system that allows players to“customize their game experience”.

Why don’t they just admit that they do not have the staff nor the players to justify a proper expansion?  It is pretty obvious that WAR is being run with a skeleton crew and that EA has pretty much abandoned it in favor of  ”The Next Big Thing”  a.k.a. Star Wars: The Old Republic.  At this point, WAR is not even on the back-burner, it has been taken completely off the stove.

Carrie and all the WAR fanboys, I hate to break it to you but this is not content.  An added race and twenty new Renown levels to grind is not content.  This game needs new zones, new endgame experiences.  It needs a lot of things but this is not it.

Hate to be Chicken Little but this is it, the beginning of the end.  WAR is just about over.  RvR while you can, folks.

Global Agenda Review

Before I get into this review, let me say that I stumbled into Global Agenda.  I had heard of it in a vague sort of way but it was never on my radar in any shape or form.  Last week I was looking through You Tube for some WAR PvP videos and I noticed that one of guys who made some excellent Warrior Priest videos had moved over to Global Agenda.  The videos he was making for GA were equally impressive and I decided, on a whim, to give it a try.  The rest of this post details my thoughts on Global Agenda.  Enjoy.

Initial Thoughts

I have a confession to make.  It is something that I am somewhat ashamed of but something I am a bit proud of as well.

I liked Tabula Rasa.

Yeah, thats right, I liked Tabula Rasa.  Strange, I know, but it was a fun game with tons of potential.  Unfortunately, that potential was never even close to being realized.  It was shut down quickly but, despite that, there was the foundation of an excellent game there.  The combat was an intriguing combination of action shooter and MMO.  The graphics were good and the story was interesting.  I was sad to see it go.

Why am I bringing up Tabula Rasa in a Global Agenda review?  Because Global Agenda has a lot of Tabula Rasa in it.  The combat is similar, the weapons are similar and I can feel Tabula Rasa’s influence when I play Global Agenda.

Like Tabula Rasa, Global Agenda has a lot of potential.  A metric ton of potential, in fact.  Will it ever realize that potential?  I don’t know but it is on the right track.  Let’s take a look at the game and see if Hi-Rez studios has improved upon the ideas present in Tabula Rasa or if it is destined for the same failure that TR was.

Classes

Character creation starts with the class decision.  There are currently four classes to choose from; Assault, Medic, Recon and Robotics.  Each brings a different skill set into the game and will appeal to widely varying play-styles.  Here are some thoughts on each class.

Assault

The Assault class is meant to be the ‘tank’ class of the game.  They are equipped with bulky power armor and spend much of their time toting around a mini-gun like the one used in Predator to mow down trees.  Because of this firepower, they are a hugely popular class and they are very, very good at what they are designed for.  They can soak up the damage like no other and, if specced into defense, are nigh impossible to bring down.

Their offensive capabilities are nothing to sneeze at either.  The mini-gun puts out a high volume of fire and includes a slight knockback when hitting enemy characters.  Additionally, they can carry various types of rocket launchers and defensive shields.  They are a complete class.

Spec-wise, they have many options to go with, from defensive heavy, to offensive juggernauts.  All three spec trees are viable, from what I have gathered, and all three are fun.  One of my friends chose the Assault class and, despite hating to play tanks in other MMOs, has specced defensively and he loves it.

Medic

The Medic, as the name suggests, is the primary healer in Global Agenda and, as with most MMO healers, is probably the least played class in the game.  This can not be attributed to the Medic’s effectiveness, they are a very good class, but to the lack of people who like to play healers.

Unlike healing in most MMOs, the Medic must aim his heals at the intended target, which adds some difficulty to the process.  They are equipped with AoE healing “grenades” but their main healing is aimed.  In addition, they have decent DPS in the form of poison attacks.  These attacks consist of grenades, DoTs and melee ‘injections’.  All of this makes for a pretty potent class and I found them a fun and challenging class in my limited time playing one.

Recon

Aaaah, the class I love to hate.  I detest Recons, not because they are not a good class, to the contrary they are a very, very good class.  I hate them because they are the antithesis of my chosen class, the Robotic.  Recon can be very effective, depending on spec, in melee or extreme long range.

They have a myriad of tools to bring the pain; samurai-looking power swords for up close, sniper rifles from ranged and an assortment of bombs, mines and stealth orbs to get in close and do damage.  They excel at destroying Robotic’s turrets and medical stations and are deadly with a sniper rifle.

The class takes a lot of skill to play properly.  Good aiming skills are a must when using the sniper rifle and circle-strafing is a necessity when meleeing.  Don’t choose this class expecting to be pro at it immediately.  Really good Recon players really separate themselves from the pack.

Robotics

Robotics is the hybrid class of Global Agenda.  Able to DPS, off-heal and even do limited tanking, they are very versatile and allow players a wide range of playstyles.  The class bears a superficial resemblance to the Engineer in Warhammer Online but is a lot more effective than the Engineer.

Robotics are masters at digging in on the defensive.  With the ability to drop turrets that do massive damage, they can really make it difficult to take an objective in PvP.  In addition, they can use drones when going on the offensive that do very good damage and can be used to take out opposing Robotic’s turrets.  Finally, they have medical stations they can drop for off-healing and force fields that can be used to block incoming damage.

Robotics are Engineers done correctly.  Mythic/Bioware would do good to give Global Agenda a spin and see how to bring some of the Robotic’s effectiveness over to the Engineer.

Character Creation

Character creation is pretty standard.  Pick a class and then customize their facial features.  Global Agenda has a pretty robust facial editor but it really does not matter.  You will quickly obtain power armor that will cover up that pretty mug of yours and no one will ever see the beautiful face you have created.

One interesting thing about character creation is the naming system.  You only have on name for all of your characters, so choose wisely.  If you name your first character foolishly every other character will have that same exact name.

Tutorial

After creation you are loaded into a cutscene that tells a little of the back story of the world and introduces your character.  The cutscene is well done and is as exciting as initial cutscenes can be.  Fortunately, you have the ability to skip the entire tutorial after the first go-around.

The tutorial itself is fairly standard.  It introduces you to your first weapons, your jetpack and the interface.  It is a quick and dirty introduction and soon dumps you into the game world proper with the begininning of a quest chain and some starter weapons.

The Dome and The Desert

From the tutorial you are placed in a hub of sorts called The Dome.  This is the main (and only) city in the game.  From here you can queue for PvE or PvP missions, visit the Auction House, test equipment in a virtual reality arena, working on crafting and get your hair cut.  For the most part, this is a large virtual lobby from which you queue for missions.  I believe that the original idea for Global Agenda was for everything to be spawned from here and not have any ‘persistent/open’ world at all.  From player feedback, Hi-Rez has decided to move away from that idea and start including more open world features.  From that, Sonoran Desert is spawned.

The Sonoran Desert is a large open-world PvE zone, not unlike a typical WoW PvE zone.  Clusters of quests and adventure areas are dispersed across the zone and slowly ramp up in difficulty.  The Desert is fairly large and looks nice.  The layout is typical of standard PvE questing zones and most will feel right at home out here.  The quests range from typical kill quests to more involved quests and also range from extremely easy to nigh on impossible without a group.

For a first foray into an open zone, Hi-Rez has done pretty good here.  I enjoyed the quests and the zone, while large, was not too large to traverse with my jetpack.  The graphics are nice and you often see sandstorms kicking up around you and the wind howling through.  From what I have seen with Sonoran Desert I am very interested to see where Hi-Rez can take us in the future.

Graphics

Before I go any further with review, I want to talk graphics.  In many ways, Global Agenda reminds me of Aion with what they have been able to accomplish with the Global Agenda engine.  The art style of the two could not be further apart but both accomplish a lot with very little.  Aion has always looked beautiful, despite not having the most advanced graphic engine from a technology stand point.  Global Agenda is the same way.  It looks great and runs flawlessly.

The armor is detailed and imposing when it wants to be.  The laser effects are awesome and the rocket launcher just exudes cool with its effects.  A heavy fire fight is just a joy to behold and looks right out of a movie at times.  All of this comes at a very low price, the engine runs flawlessly for me, even under a heavy load.  I have been in the middle of large fire fights, with turrets blasting away, force fields sprouting up and the Assault class mowing things down with their mini0gun and kept a constant 60+ FPS.  That is pretty impressive in my mind.

PvE Missions

PvE missions can be queued up from level five and are broken up into brackets depending on your level.  The first missions are quite simple and involve only one boss.  As you get higher you will see increasingly more complex missions and they get quite hard.  They do remind me of standard MMO instances in many ways but the addition of FPS-style combat and ranged tanking make the familiarity passing at most.

The combat certainly changes everything in PvE.  It is very reminiscent of Tabula Rasa and enemies can and will use supressing fire, flank you and retreat if needed.  I think the A.I. is a small cut above the standard A.I. found in MMOs.  The boss fights can be as complex as many WoW PvE boss fights, as each boss has its own special abilities.  Charges, knockbacks, AoE fire attacks, adds and the like all make their appearance.

I want to stress, however, that even though the bosses have similar abilities to your typical WoW boss, the mob A.I. and the 3rd person shooter style combat brings the encounters to an entirely different realm.  I have really enjoyed all the missions have partaken in thus far.

PvP

There are a few different types of PvP in Global Agenda but, thus far, I have only partaken in Mercenary PvP.  Mercenary PvP is a lot like WoW battlegrounds or a typical Counter-Strike map.  Two teams, different objectives depending on map and away we go.

That said, the PvP is fast, frantic and, most importantly, fun. Even better, I have rarely been in fights that did not go the distance.  Almost every fight I have been in has been a fight to the finish, no team has run away with it.  These are very competitive PvP matches.  I think that is helped by the fact that, at least in Mercenary mode, you can only queue yourself and one other up.  No premades running rampant and destroying everything.

The PvP also seems very, very well balanced.  Every class has their place and every class is needed.  Assault to capture objectives, medics to heal, robotics to defend and recons to supply high DPS and destroy turrets and implacements.  Every class is capable of winning the match and being the hero, if played properly.

Closing Thoughts

I stumbled onto Global Agenda and I am very glad I did.  It is tremendously fun and there is a whole lot of potential here.  I do hope to see more persistent zones (both PvE and PvP), endgame raids and a DAoC-style PvP endgame at some point but even without those it is tremendously fun.  The combat is a refreshing change of pace as is the sci-fi setting.  Even better, the game has no monthly sub and can be picked up for only 29 bucks on Steam.  That is a great deal.

I hope that Hi-Rez can make Global Agenda a success.  I really do not want to see it go the way of Tabula Rasa, there is simply too much potential here and a lot of fun to be had.

By the way, I am finishing up my first poor attempt at a PvP video tonight and should have it posted tomorrow, along with a more detailed description of PvP in general and Robotics PvP in particular!

WAR is a Strange Beast

The review and video for Global Agenda is still in the pipeline but, while I am waiting to build up enough raw video for the PvP video, I wanted to talk a little about Warhammer Online.  I had recently given it another try and it just really confounds me.

WAR, as I have said before, was easily my most anticipated MMO ever.  I loved DAOC and I awaited WAR with the anticipation of a little girl at a Justin Whatshisname concert.  Of course, like many, I was immensely disappointed.  I have tried again and again to return to WAR, hoping beyond hope that things had finally improved enough to return to full time.  Time and time again, it has disappointed me.  Not only that but I can get no feel for what Mythic is trying to do with the game.  None at all.

For one, WAR is the only MMO I can think of that, two years out from release, has seemingly removed almost as much content as they have added.  They have removed Fortresses, reduced Auction House functionality and, although not removed completely, have reduced each side to one viable Tier One zone.  On the flip side, they have added Land of the Dead.  As far as I can tell that is really all they have added.  To me, that is a net loss.

Additionally, there are many parts of WAR that come across as amateurish at best.  Take NPC pathing for instance.  In AoC, WoW or just about any other MMO I can think of, when you pull a mob it paths right to you, every so often you will see weird bugs or pathing issues but that is the exception.  In WAR it seems to rubber band back and forth, run backwards to you or teleport past you.  No rhyme or reason, the pathing is just bad.  Really?  Two years out in a AAA MMO and they can’t even get pathing right?  I just don’t understand that.

The PvE is extremely poorly implemented.  The instances and their boss encounters are a joke.  The pathing issues extend to the instances and the boss abilities are just strange.  It is hard to describe but they are just not as tight as they are in WoW, LotRO or AoC.  It is so bad that no one does PvE instances anymore from what I can tell.  Bastion Stair is dead, no one does the low level city instances and the PQs are empty more often than not.

Now, I know that WAR is a PvP game but, damn, if you are going to have PvE in your game then do it right.  Seems Mythic is lost when it comes to coding PvE and Mob AI.  I just don’t understand it.  The PvE is not up to a AAA MMO standard.  It is amateurish at best.

I understand Mythic is supposed to have a big announcement this week and, for their sake, I hope it is big.  They need it, badly.  No new content in almost two years will kill a MMO.  There is only so much of the scenario/Keep Siege/City Siege treadmill that people can take.  Even for the biggest WAR supporters it will get stale eventually.  New content is a must and it better not be something minor like a new race or two.  It better be something major.  New instances, new zones and new things to do at endgame.

If the announcement this week is anything less, I think you might as well start writing WAR’s obituary.  It will be a sad day but it will be time.

The Fate of AoC and Where I am Headed Now

So, I have decided to put down Age of Conan for the time being.  The PvE is still awesome, maybe one of the best around PvE wise.  Tons of stuff to do at the level cap, interesting instances and lots of faction grinds.  Really not much different than WoW in that respect, with better graphics, a more visceral approach and a different combat system.

But, I am just about PvE’d out.  I like to PvE and PvP in my MMOs.  Mix it up if you will but AoC’s PvP is dead in the water.  It should be fun.  It really should be.  Most of the pieces are in place.  A great combat system, mini-games, sieges, PvP areas….its all there.  But is just is not implemented well.

The mini-games pop so infrequently that you can go for hours without seeing one.  Then, when they do finally pop, you find yourself against a twinked pre-made that proceeds to obliterate your poor PuG in humiliating fashion.  Then its back to the queue for another four hours and the cycle continues.  No fun.

The PvP areas and Shrines of Bori are a complete mess.  Basically you PvE to get PvP levels.  There are people in game that are the highest PvP level in the game that have never killed anyone in PvP.  Ever. How wrong is that?  It is, frankly, depressing.

To top it all off, hacks are bad in AoC.  There is a program called AoCbuddy that is used frequently by players in the game.  It allows for teleports, speed-hacks and radar.  Apparently it has been around for a long, long time, yet Funcom has not done anything to address it.  I know almost every MMO has hacks but I have never seen one so blatantly used as I have AOCBuddy.

Put all that together and it makes for a bleak PvP experience.  Its very sad because when I am able to get into a PvP fight with someone around my level and not using hacks, it is incredibly fun.  So are the PuG vs. PuG mini-games I have been in.  The game absolutely cries out for meaningful PvP but Funcom keeps ignoring the PvP’ers.

Long story short, until they fix the PvP, I am gone.  I love the PvE but it is not enough to keep my subbed.  I need some variety.

So, what am I doing now?  Well, I found Global Agenda.  This was a game I completely ignored when it was released.  It was nowhere on my radar and I can’t even remember when it was released.  However, last week I was looking through You-Tube for some WAR PvP videos and I found that one of the guys who released some of the best Warrior Priest videos had quit WAR and was now making Global Agenda videos.  I was intrigued so I clicked on one and was instantly impressed by the fast-paced combat.

I downloaded the demo and, soon after, bought the game.  Gonna have a full review up tomorrow, as well as a PvP video I am working on.  Stay tuned!

Does a Car Hitting a MMO Blogger Make a Sound if No One is Around to Hear It??? (or Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K!)

Another long time away from posting for me.  Normal excuses apply this time around.  Two of my supervisors at work moved on to new positions in the company and, as a result, I now have two new supervisors.  I also moved up into a new supervisor position.  All of which have kept me crazy busy over the last few weeks.

In addition, I got hit by a car.  Yes, as in bodily struck by a car.  Not something that happens to most people, right?  Well, it was just my luck.  I now have a good story to tell folks though.  You see, there is a small convenience store right down the street from where I live, a Circle-K in point of fact.  It is close enough that I often walk there for cold drinks and the like.  Well, on this particular night, that is exactly what I was doing and, thus, the story begins.

As I entered the parking lot, I saw a car sitting to the side of the store, passenger door open and engine running.  This is not normal.  No one parks here, especially with their engine running and one door open.  To get to the store I had to walk in front of the car and, just as I drew even with the front of the car, a guy in his teens to early-20s comes running out of the store carrying two cases of beer.

Well, this also was strange.  It was too late for beer to be sold in my area and the guy did not really look old enough to purchase beer anyway.  He ran around the back of the car, threw the beer in the back and jumped into the passenger seat.  At this point it was obvious that he had stolen the beer and they were out to make a getaway.

Now, I am still standing directly in front of the car and still absorbing all of this information and coalescing it into rational thought.  Yeah, sometimes I am slow.  It finally dawned on me:  “hey, these guys are stealing beer and I am directly blocking their one way out of Dodge!”.

Deciding that retreat was the better part of valor, I started to move out of the way just as the car jumped forward.  It stopped about 6 inches from me and the passenger in the car yelled out for the driver to gun it.  He did.

By this time, I was almost out from in front of the car.  Well, all but my left leg, which the car proceeded to hit.  I am ashamed to say that in the war between the car and my left knee, the car won.  And won decisively.  It spun me around but (amazingly) did not knock me down and away went the car.

Equally amazing, I had the presence of mind to get the license plate as they sped out of the parking lot.  This proved to be very helpful to the nice policeman who answered the call that was placed a few minutes later.  He took all my information, the cashier at the store’s information and another witnesses information.

Long story short, I have a sprained knee, with possible ligament damage.  I won’t know for sure until I go to the orthopedist but I do know it hurts like a bitch and has a rather large bruise spreading across my knee.

Unfortunately for the perpetrator’s of this foul deed, the police were able to use the license plate information I gave them to track them down.  In their hurry to leave the scene of the crime they had elevated a simple petty theft charge into armed robbery, assault with a deadly weapon and attempted murder charges.  All because they hit me with the car and the car is considered a weapon if used in the commision of a crime.

Geniuses they are.

So, what am I doing in the MMO world?  Well folks, that is a separate post but I promise I have not been idle and I promise that post is coming soon.  You will be surprised by what I am playing now because I know I am!

By the way, bonus points to anyone who can tell me what the quote I used in the title to this post is from!!

A Controller to match WoW’s Current Difficulty Rating!

In honor of Pitrelli’s suggestion for the perfect controller for AoC, I have found the perfect controller to demonstrate WoW’s difficulty rating. Introducing the WoW-troller:

The perfect accessory for any current or future WoW player!!

Not only does the state of the art controller have all the controls you need for those intense (well, not really.  They are pretty dumbed-down, ez-mode now) raid fights but it even comes with five buttons to place all the brightly-colored, goofy Lucky Charm raid symbols on your raid targets.  Not that you really need to because CC is apparently too difficult for current raiders to grasp.

Order yours today!!!

Of PvP: WoW and AoC.

In one of my earlier posts about WoW the comments veered off into a discussion about which game, WoW or AoC,  had the more skill-based combat system especially in PvP.  Pitrelli contends that AoC is “who spams most buttons wins”.  After playing a melee character extensively in AoC and playing WoW for 5 years, I have to totally disagree.

Before I go any further, let me get this out of the way; I do not dislike WoW’s combat system. Matter of fact, I love WoW’s combat system.  I have always said that WoW is a MMO that plays like a FPS.  Fast, responsive and tight.  It has a great feel.

Now, back to the discussion.  Pitrelli had two major gripes in the discussion we had:

1.  Combat in AoC comes down to “spamming buttons” due to his perceived lack of counters or reactives.

2.  Combat in AoC is slower.

Let’s take this one at a time.  First, let’s take a look at the “spamming” argument. For sake of argument, I am going to use only melee characters for this discussion.  The casters in both games play very similarly.  Melee is where the difference lies.

In melee the most important factor is the range.  After all, if you can not get close to your target, you can not do damage to them as melee.  In WoW if you are not in range and you use an ability you get a simple message that you are not in range and nothing happens.  The ability does not fire.  Nothing gained, nothing lost.  I have not lost rage/mana/energy.

In AoC the experience is totally different.  If I am not in range and I use an ability, the ability does fire.  It goes off but I gain nothing because my target is not in range.  This is bad.  Why?  Because when the ability fires it goes on cooldown, it uses my stamina and it locks me in place for a second or more while the animation plays.  Obviously, you do not want this to happen.  You want to make sure you are in range when you use that ability.  Missed combos can be death in AoC.

What is the result of these two systems?  In WoW, when I played my feral druid and was attempting to attack a mage, I simply spammed Claw (or whatever) until I was in range.  No harm done.  Once I was in range the ability went off and I went to the next one.  In AoC I can not do that.  I must be much more deliberate with my ability usage.  I do not finish a combo unless I know I am going to hit the target.  I am very deliberate when I go through my attack sequences and I spam a lot less.

But what about the contention that it is a spam-fest because of lack of counters or reactive abilities?

Completely incorrect.

Counters and reactive abilities are very important in both WoW and AoC.  In WoW, silences, stuns, knockbacks and other counters abound.  Don’t want that Priest to get off a heal?  The rogue kicks him.  Don’t want the shaman to get out of rang?  Death-grip him back.  WoW is full of counters like these and it is one reason WoW has engaging PvP.

Guess what?  AoC has just as many counters.  Already on my Conqueror, not even level 40, I have a silence, two knock-downs, a “bubble” and a charge.  As I level I get another bubble and a few other reactive tools to add to my arsenal.

Pitrelli’s second argument, about combat being slow, is harder to argue.  I believe the perceived slowness is more an unfamiliarity with the combat system because it plays so much differently than any other MMO out there.  Because you have to be much more deliberate with your key presses than you do in WoW, it can feel slower especially in the early levels before you get a lot of abilities.  However, once you get higher, combat becomes frenetic.  There is much more to keep track of in AoC than in WoW.  Range is much more important, as is position.  Combine that with moving through your combos, active blocking, counters and your double-tap buffs and combat can get really crazy.

I will not argue that combat in AoC is better than WoW.  That is a completely subjective opinion.  Pitrelli, and anyone else who has played AoC, has every right to say that they prefer WoW combat to combat found in AoC.  However, AoC’s combat is more complex and it is a more “skill-based” system than WoW.  Some people will like this, some won’t.  Some people will like the complexity but dislike the feel of AoC combat and that is fine too.  I will only say that it is nice to see a MMO break away from the standard MMO combat that we have seen since EQ.

For that, I thank Funcom.