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silent-circuit
[H]F Junkie
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2005
- Messages
- 16,136
Rift...
I'm getting increasingly bored / frustrated with this game. I keep switching shards (servers), classes, and builds hoping something will be different. No such luck.
Leveling is miserable now. I've gone through the first 20-25 levels about 7 times now with a mix of Defiants and Guardians. It's exactly the same. Every. Time. No branching, no variation apart from the weak and sparse race-specific quests. I had fun the first few times, but I keep running in to places in the low 30s that annoy me either through excessive grinding / repetition, sudden ramping up in difficulty, boring area / mob design, or a combination thereof. I start having to rely on other people, who are consistently annoying and stupid / unreliable themselves. I get tired of dieing. I get tired of doing the same stuff over and over. I get tired of going back to the same areas to pick up stuff / kill stuff / place stuff over and over.
The sense of accomplishment and discovery that I enjoyed a few weeks ago when I started playing is pretty much gone now. As I said above, even switching shards and going Guardian when I'd had all Defiants on the same shard previously didn't bring the 'excitement' back for me. I've also been somewhat disappointed from the start and the relative lack of character customization in this game and limited range of races / types represented -- 2/3rds of all the races are either humans or elves. Boring. Dwarves? Also boring. The only even slightly compelling race is the Bahmi, and they're just sort of blah.
I like discovery. I want to explore and find new things. I realize this isn't the 'point' of this game and have realized from the start, but hoped there would be enough there to hold my interest for at least a few months. The areas were somewhat varied, the artifacts somewhat interesting; it was okay for a while, just not enough anymore. Now I've got another 6 months paid (maybe 3, I can't recall at the moment)... and no real desire to continue. I'm in a guild (got promoted to officer almost immediately), there are people around for me to group with and talk to, it's just not enough to hold my interest. I am almost universally terrible at PvP and have no real interest in it, so there's little incentive for me to get to end game apart from shiny equipment. I kind of got over the equipment for equipment's sake thing back when I finished Diablo II...
Probably going to sell my account / game time some time in the next few weeks and hope someone else finds themself a better fit for the game.
I've considered other MMOs, but I don't think there's anything out there really geared to 'people like me' who mostly just like to explore and solve puzzles and stuff, or even cater to 'us' as a sort of aside from the main game mechanics. At least, nothing that doesn't consist almost entirely of rainbows unicorns and sunshine marketed to seven year old girls. Sorry to be close-minded, but that's just "not my bag."
I tried Age of Conan since it seems to start off more like a single player game with a fair bit of character development (and the trial is free / game and expansion total a whopping $13 on Amazon right now). That and there's "Adventures" right there in the sub-title. No dice there either. I don't enjoy the combat system, the pacing feels off, and for all the ranting and raving I've seen / heard about the graphics in the game and beautiful landscapes, I was not impressed. Took a whole night to download near 7GB, played the game for maybe 3 hours total and felt like I'd been cheated despite not paying a cent. I've yet to uninstall and may give it another hour or two at some point (again, free after all) but unless something really amazing happens, don't see much changing. There's no real exploration, at least not yet, just paths / corridors with the occasional small offshoot with a boss standing around, a city... blah. Almost no world interaction. Nothing much to find. Nothing much to do apart from find people and go kill / collect random stuff for them just like every other MMO I've ever tried. So, more of the same.
I've been following The Secret World for a while, but the more I see the more I think it's going to be just another boring group monster killing MMO, not the amazing game that could've risen out of the original concept. Secret societies, mystery, mayhem, ancient plots, discovery and deduction? Yes please! Oh wait, it's going to be the same multiple faction everyone fighting for power let's go to this place and kill monsters then beat up on people in PvP crap? Yeah no thanks. The thing that pisses me off the most? "There are not levels in our game" stated over and over... then there's a goddamn XP bar across the bottom of the screen in the preview clear as day, which you fill to get points. Points used to buy skills. Which is why you level in every other goddamn game. Don't worry though, they're on a big circle not a 'tree' so it's different. Way different, cause we moved all your stat boosts to skills and equipment. Just... exactly the same. Yeah rite -- try harder assholes, nobody's fooled.
So is there anything out there? I imagine someone will say "Minecraft" and while I do enjoy it occasionally there isn't enough variation in what you can find in the game for me. "Yay, diamonds!" can only go through my head so many times. If I make all the stuff I want out of diamonds, why would I care about finding more diamonds? The limited height and depth of the world pisses me off a bit too, as it's so arbitrary and unnecessary. Landscapes and caves, while they can be impressive for a while, don't have a ton of variation either. I haven't played in a while though -- have they implemented multiple 'areas' in a world yet? Like grass to desert to snow? Not that that would really be 'enough' to satisfy what I'm looking for now.
I do realize that this sort of thing really lends itself better to single player games, but there hasn't been a lot of development there lately either. Myst: Uru and the expansion Path of the Shell were probably the closest to my ideal in this genre I ever found, but after removal of the online component the worlds grew stale and I lost interest a few weeks or months later. I'd been there, done that, and there was no one to share it with / show it to anymore.
I'm having trouble articulating what I'm looking for, really.
My perfect game would go something like the following. So far as I know, there's nothing like it out there. Please tell me I'm wrong.
A huge, huge world, maybe even procedurally generated so there's no way to run out of places to discover. Wide variation in population / architecture / culture / flora and fauna. Goes way beyond pallette swaps. I hate pallette swaps. Ideally some kind of ancient / forgotten / destroyed civilization, technologically or otherwise advanced from which the players can find artifacts and buildings / complexes / vehicles / etc if they look hard enough. Focus on survival (environmental factors, animals in jungles, crime in cities, etc) and problem solving (discovering and unlocking new areas, secret societies, diffusing political issues, revolutions, etc) / technical ability (fixing and jerry-rigging artifacts to be useful, research, etc). Fighting should be secondary and almost completely avoidable -- there are billions of people at get along just fine not beating the crap out of everything all the time. Multiple professions, from the sort of treasure-hunter type I've been describing primarily to merchants, mercenaries, diplomats. Everyone could have their own city if they wanted since the world could expand on demand, being procedural in nature, so you wouldn't be limited by what others were doing or wanted to do, you could potentially just go off on your own to the edge of the world / universe / whatever and start anew. If others showed up and showed interest they could get in on the fun, if not, fine, you still get to play 'your way.' Lots of mystery, uncertainty, an extensive story discovered through study of the artifacts and civilizations discovered.
A sort of interactive archaeology space opera universe simulation with focus on storytelling, neat gadgets, and problem solving. Kinda like an expedition to RAMA (Arthur C. Clarke) on an even larger scale. Bordering on the impossible to create and with little mass market appeal, I know. The above description is a very simplified basis for a MUD a friend and I started working on years ago, but were overwhelmed and couldn't even manage in text. Add a 3D engine and quadruple the player population, and you get even closer to the impossible. So much for that..
Anything even approaching it?
I'm getting increasingly bored / frustrated with this game. I keep switching shards (servers), classes, and builds hoping something will be different. No such luck.
Leveling is miserable now. I've gone through the first 20-25 levels about 7 times now with a mix of Defiants and Guardians. It's exactly the same. Every. Time. No branching, no variation apart from the weak and sparse race-specific quests. I had fun the first few times, but I keep running in to places in the low 30s that annoy me either through excessive grinding / repetition, sudden ramping up in difficulty, boring area / mob design, or a combination thereof. I start having to rely on other people, who are consistently annoying and stupid / unreliable themselves. I get tired of dieing. I get tired of doing the same stuff over and over. I get tired of going back to the same areas to pick up stuff / kill stuff / place stuff over and over.
The sense of accomplishment and discovery that I enjoyed a few weeks ago when I started playing is pretty much gone now. As I said above, even switching shards and going Guardian when I'd had all Defiants on the same shard previously didn't bring the 'excitement' back for me. I've also been somewhat disappointed from the start and the relative lack of character customization in this game and limited range of races / types represented -- 2/3rds of all the races are either humans or elves. Boring. Dwarves? Also boring. The only even slightly compelling race is the Bahmi, and they're just sort of blah.
I like discovery. I want to explore and find new things. I realize this isn't the 'point' of this game and have realized from the start, but hoped there would be enough there to hold my interest for at least a few months. The areas were somewhat varied, the artifacts somewhat interesting; it was okay for a while, just not enough anymore. Now I've got another 6 months paid (maybe 3, I can't recall at the moment)... and no real desire to continue. I'm in a guild (got promoted to officer almost immediately), there are people around for me to group with and talk to, it's just not enough to hold my interest. I am almost universally terrible at PvP and have no real interest in it, so there's little incentive for me to get to end game apart from shiny equipment. I kind of got over the equipment for equipment's sake thing back when I finished Diablo II...
Probably going to sell my account / game time some time in the next few weeks and hope someone else finds themself a better fit for the game.
I've considered other MMOs, but I don't think there's anything out there really geared to 'people like me' who mostly just like to explore and solve puzzles and stuff, or even cater to 'us' as a sort of aside from the main game mechanics. At least, nothing that doesn't consist almost entirely of rainbows unicorns and sunshine marketed to seven year old girls. Sorry to be close-minded, but that's just "not my bag."
I tried Age of Conan since it seems to start off more like a single player game with a fair bit of character development (and the trial is free / game and expansion total a whopping $13 on Amazon right now). That and there's "Adventures" right there in the sub-title. No dice there either. I don't enjoy the combat system, the pacing feels off, and for all the ranting and raving I've seen / heard about the graphics in the game and beautiful landscapes, I was not impressed. Took a whole night to download near 7GB, played the game for maybe 3 hours total and felt like I'd been cheated despite not paying a cent. I've yet to uninstall and may give it another hour or two at some point (again, free after all) but unless something really amazing happens, don't see much changing. There's no real exploration, at least not yet, just paths / corridors with the occasional small offshoot with a boss standing around, a city... blah. Almost no world interaction. Nothing much to find. Nothing much to do apart from find people and go kill / collect random stuff for them just like every other MMO I've ever tried. So, more of the same.
I've been following The Secret World for a while, but the more I see the more I think it's going to be just another boring group monster killing MMO, not the amazing game that could've risen out of the original concept. Secret societies, mystery, mayhem, ancient plots, discovery and deduction? Yes please! Oh wait, it's going to be the same multiple faction everyone fighting for power let's go to this place and kill monsters then beat up on people in PvP crap? Yeah no thanks. The thing that pisses me off the most? "There are not levels in our game" stated over and over... then there's a goddamn XP bar across the bottom of the screen in the preview clear as day, which you fill to get points. Points used to buy skills. Which is why you level in every other goddamn game. Don't worry though, they're on a big circle not a 'tree' so it's different. Way different, cause we moved all your stat boosts to skills and equipment. Just... exactly the same. Yeah rite -- try harder assholes, nobody's fooled.
So is there anything out there? I imagine someone will say "Minecraft" and while I do enjoy it occasionally there isn't enough variation in what you can find in the game for me. "Yay, diamonds!" can only go through my head so many times. If I make all the stuff I want out of diamonds, why would I care about finding more diamonds? The limited height and depth of the world pisses me off a bit too, as it's so arbitrary and unnecessary. Landscapes and caves, while they can be impressive for a while, don't have a ton of variation either. I haven't played in a while though -- have they implemented multiple 'areas' in a world yet? Like grass to desert to snow? Not that that would really be 'enough' to satisfy what I'm looking for now.
I do realize that this sort of thing really lends itself better to single player games, but there hasn't been a lot of development there lately either. Myst: Uru and the expansion Path of the Shell were probably the closest to my ideal in this genre I ever found, but after removal of the online component the worlds grew stale and I lost interest a few weeks or months later. I'd been there, done that, and there was no one to share it with / show it to anymore.
I'm having trouble articulating what I'm looking for, really.
My perfect game would go something like the following. So far as I know, there's nothing like it out there. Please tell me I'm wrong.
A huge, huge world, maybe even procedurally generated so there's no way to run out of places to discover. Wide variation in population / architecture / culture / flora and fauna. Goes way beyond pallette swaps. I hate pallette swaps. Ideally some kind of ancient / forgotten / destroyed civilization, technologically or otherwise advanced from which the players can find artifacts and buildings / complexes / vehicles / etc if they look hard enough. Focus on survival (environmental factors, animals in jungles, crime in cities, etc) and problem solving (discovering and unlocking new areas, secret societies, diffusing political issues, revolutions, etc) / technical ability (fixing and jerry-rigging artifacts to be useful, research, etc). Fighting should be secondary and almost completely avoidable -- there are billions of people at get along just fine not beating the crap out of everything all the time. Multiple professions, from the sort of treasure-hunter type I've been describing primarily to merchants, mercenaries, diplomats. Everyone could have their own city if they wanted since the world could expand on demand, being procedural in nature, so you wouldn't be limited by what others were doing or wanted to do, you could potentially just go off on your own to the edge of the world / universe / whatever and start anew. If others showed up and showed interest they could get in on the fun, if not, fine, you still get to play 'your way.' Lots of mystery, uncertainty, an extensive story discovered through study of the artifacts and civilizations discovered.
A sort of interactive archaeology space opera universe simulation with focus on storytelling, neat gadgets, and problem solving. Kinda like an expedition to RAMA (Arthur C. Clarke) on an even larger scale. Bordering on the impossible to create and with little mass market appeal, I know. The above description is a very simplified basis for a MUD a friend and I started working on years ago, but were overwhelmed and couldn't even manage in text. Add a 3D engine and quadruple the player population, and you get even closer to the impossible. So much for that..
Anything even approaching it?
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