All Posts by Sylvene

Originally posted by Ugottawantit  also $10.00 cheaper at Amazon.com than on Razer's sight

It's a correction to 1,200.  I just talked to Stradden who heard from Cryptic.

Somone mispoke - I think he meant twelve hundred, not twelve thousand.  OR it could be my English education.  After 25 years in the US, I'm still not used to hearing the colloquail usage in speech - saying "twelve hundred" instead of saying "one thousand two hundred." 

It was repeated several times and I wrote down 12K each time.  :p

Cheers,

I think it will also be a useful tool for parents who don't want people to know how young their kids are, and girls who'd rather not reveal their genders.  :)

I like the idea of sounding like my male dwarf in DDO.  ;)  I don't need complete strangers to know that the person behind my dwarven warrior is a woman.

Hmm... I checked that fee by logging into my Station Account too, since I thought the fee had gone up a month or so back.

Heh.  I just tried it to log into my Station Account and they are "experiencing technical difficulties, please check back again later."  So I can't verify it at this time.  I'll send an email to SoE to find out for sure. 

Originally posted by Hatsumi74
As a side note, the monthly fee for EQ is now $14.99.  They raised it several months ago.  I pay for Station Access or whatever it's called, but I distinctly remember increasing my checkbook entry before I added Vanguard to my list of games.

That's real chainmail by the way - spendy stuff - and they won between them... a lifetime subscription to the game, some game cards and I think a collector's edition of the software.  Not bad for being nerds.  ;)

Heh.  Yeah.  I was pondering... Nazgul?  Death rider?  Just a skeleton?  But he wasn't talking.  ;)

Originally posted by Vrazule
I don't plan on playing the game, but I was still disturbed to see that after 8 hours of play, she had barely made level 3.  That is some stiff time requirment.

For the record.

After about 8 hours of game play.

High Elf Cleric - level 7 - took a dive immediately to check the death penalties. 

Wood Elf Ranger - level 4 & completed first 2 diplomacy quests

Thestran Human - level 2 & completed first diplomacy quest, harvesting quests and grouping to check out what it did for harvesting

Goblin Blood Mage, Orc Shaman, Mordebi Human Warrior (and a couple others I've since deleted) to check out starting experiences.

Originally posted by Cymdai
I think a lot of people read the preview and interpreted it to be a review.

There's a pretty big difference.

Not only is it a preview, it's a "First Impressions" of a new game at Pre-Launch stage with a total of about 8 hours in-game.  The standard requirement by MMORPG.com for a Review is two months of game time after official launch and about 3,000 words plus Ratings in 8 different areas.  Heh.  It can't even be called a "At First Glance" article because the game only launches today. 

Editor Jon (and previously Dana) deliberately will not send a "fanboi" to review a game.  I was the biggest skeptic in the bunch and frankly, I was pleasantly surprised and impressed by my early experience.  Despite some bugs... despite the difficulty in figuring out which death option gave me the least xp debt... despite my getting horribly lost in some areas and whining for maps.

I've seen some impressive trains.  I'm wondering if the way xp is awarded will allow for power leveling.  I have yet to explore the trade-skill gameplay, I'm in total LOVE with diplomacy at this stage despite some NPCs that "cheat" by having more cards and the ability to play them faster than I.

 Different strokes for different folks.  From what I've seen, it looks like pretty good mix of challenge and temperance of tedium.  For example the map & direction system.

You don't have to practice "Sense Heading" you have a compass that works.  You can get locations marked on that compass - from Quests and from town guards.  There aren't any detailed ingame maps but there is a large overview map with some key locations marked.  You aren't spoon-fed nor are you just thrown into a completely new landscape without any tools to find your way.

The game launches today.   The jury is still out of whether the game will keep my attention long term - I have yet to explore the game with any depth. 

{Edit}  Oh... P.S.  /wave Kevyn Padraig on the Florendyl server.  Thanks for twinking me that Novice Woodsman Axe!

Originally posted by Sinuous
I was under the impression this game would be released in Q2 of 2007, which starts a bit earlier than summer.  Did you come up with "Due to launch in summer 2007" based on something one of the developers said?

Yes.  :)  Remember though, that June is summer and still Q2.  I'm not saying that it's a June launch though.  They will launch when they launch.  Heck... they haven't even started taking beta sign ups.

Originally posted by aristoculous


PS. Is there any info on PVP? PVP with squads?

Yes.  PvP - one on one dueling or Arena with squads - whether they will have duelling with squads... ya know... I didn't ask.  Sorry.

Originally posted by AricB
how is the combat in this game? Its looks real good so far but I wanna know what combat system are they going with, will it be something like COH/COV or SWG, or WOW or Age Of Conan , or something diffrent from all of these.

Combat is similar to many current MMOs out there.  Auto-attack plus Feats which require power (similar to other games' abilities or skills - such as EQ2), Combination moves which require combo points (similar to other games' special moves which require charges - I'm thinking of first person PC games here, and Fury does the same thing) - and special Favor attacks - for example, Thor allows you to call down an AE lightning storm.  ;)

Dodging / ripostes etc. are automatic and not controlled, unlike DDO which actually allows you to block & tumble.  Hope that answers your quetsion.

Originally posted by Ironman2000
I would like to hear from Carolyn why they couldn't get into the game today.  It just seems kinda sad that they couldn't even log in for a game preview.

Well, first they lost the internet connection, then after we got that back, we could not log in.  Brad spent some time on the phone and then we ran slap bang into an update.  We did get into the game and they showed me a few things - like the really cool ships and housing, but I basically ran out of time. 

They had technical issues in the suite that morning and had already pushed the appointment back an hour.  Vanguard was the last game in the rotation for me - other press were there as well - and I just ran out of time.  Heh.  I munched on their lunch so I could have enough time to get as much info as possible before I had to go to make another appointment.

CES isn't like E3 where they have many stations all showing the same game, and usually, a local server with them.  They have one each in a hotel suite and we're dependent on the hotel's internet connection, etc.

Unfortunately, at an event where the focus is on Consumer Electronics, it was tough just finding a "talking head" to talk to me about hardware of interest to gamers!

"This is our new Media Center PC with built in TV tuner..."  So tell me about the gamer rig. 

"These are our hard drive / server / rack mount / USB drives / etc."  Don't you make high-performance RAM too? 

"Our wireless headphones are great for the salesman that needs to leave his desk and go out into the warehouse to check on stock."  Got anything geared toward gamers?

Also, yes - both Turbine and Funcom were at the Games for Windows booth.  But one article at a time.  I'm working the show too.

/tired

P.S.  Tell Stradden that MMORPG.com should be covering more gaming hardware.  ;)

Me... I'd love to see a Steam-punk world.  :D 

With Vampires & Werewolves.   *nods*

Originally posted by F'lar

Ok there are Two subjects herer and the author does not go into much depth with either.

   First she talks about how MMO's have crappy sounds ( someting I agree with), but she doesnot elaberate, Then she goes into another topic of computer speakers, and true I do have a cheap 2.1 $40 speakers but they do the job, and in that one she just raves about what SHE has done and not other options.

 

   All in all a decent artical but nothing informative.

Actually, I think MMOGs are getting pretty good with their sound, and getting better. 

As for other options... better speakers?   Seriously.  Unless I'm not understanding your meaning.  If you have a game with kick-ass graphics and a screaming fast graphics card, you'll want to hook up a screaming fast monitor to it, not something that has a 24ms response time and capable only of 800 x 600 pixel display.  Same with sound.  If the game has really good sound and you want to take advantage of it, you'll want a good sound card and want to hook up some good speakers to your system.

Now... if you are looking for speaker recommendations... I could go into some drool-worthy mega-buck high-end audiophile stuff. 

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Originally posted by Vrazule

I truly believe that once a game comes out that caters exclusively to casuals from beginning to end, they will discover the real financial power of the masses and they will realize that we casuals will stick around as long as they put out the type of content that we enjoy. 

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Ahh the financial power... at the Austin Game Convention, Parks Associates (a research group) released a study:

Parks Associates identifies six segments:

• Power gamers represent 11 percent of the gamer market but account for 30 cents of every dollar spent on retail and online games.
• Social gamers enjoy gaming as a way to interact with friends.
• Leisure gamers spend 58 hours per month playing games but mainly on casual titles. Nevertheless they prefer challenging titles and show high interest in new gaming services.
• Dormant gamers love gaming but spend little time because of family, work, or school. They like to play with friends and family and prefer complex and challenging games.
• Incidental gamers lack motivation and play games mainly out of boredom. However, they spend more than 20 hours a month playing online games.
• Occasional gamers play puzzle, word, and board games almost exclusively.

Traditionally ignored by marketers, the three segments Social Gamers, Leisure Gamers, and Dormant Gamers account for 53% of the Internet gamer population and 56% of the retail revenue, according to Electronic Gaming in the Digital Home.