Profile: melmoth1
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• • MMORPGs and the current economic downturn

  • Economies all across the world are being battered by the economic aftermath of the subprime fiasco. Banks implode, currencies plummet, and record levels of unemployment are predicted for the UK, Europe and North America. Some even compare this, in potential magnitude, to the Great Wall Street Crash of 1929, from which the world economy didn't recover until 1946, and only because the rebuilding of a war ravaged world created Keynsian style boom in reconstruction.

    I read over on  the Darkfall forums some chap saying that a game like darkfall - or any new game for that matter - was now exposed to launching a game in a time severe of economic hardship, both in terms of finance capital and consumer spending.

    However, I do have a positive spin on this. In the 1930s, there were no mmorpgs of course, but there was a relatively new popular entertainment industry that had only recently emerged as mass entertainment: the cinema. In fact, the 1930s was a golden age of cinema. Interestingly enough, the gloomy economic times created a love of a darker, more melancholic and more expressionist cinema and saw the creation of amazing movies like "Dracula", "Frankenstein", "The Mummy", "Wolfman" etc. Germany experienced her economic meltdown much earlier in the immediate aftermath of WW1 and saw classic "popular" films like "The Cabinet of Dr Caligari", "Metropolis", "M", "Pandora Box" etc.

    Now mmorpg, a relatively new form of popular entertainment  (like cinema used to be) , finds itself in an era of profound economic and social anxieties. Will we see a similar development? MMOs that are appealing to the darker moods and psychological anxieties that will form the undercurrent of the collective consciousness and unconsiousness of the masses?

    I certainly hope so.  We need something fresh in this overly stale catalogue of clone-like mmo releases.

    These coming 5 years will prove if MMOs have the same flexibility and freedom of vision that the movie industry has.

    Interesting times.

    Regards

    Melmoth

  • Posted: 10/10/08 5:44 PM
    General Discussion
• • Server Merges...Seriously

  • Erm, because I am from the UK and I keep in touch with UK mates thru gaming smart-ass. Meaning: I did indeed choose the correct copy of the game (sigh).

    I have have been playing Euro servers on all the mmorpgs I have played while living in Japan for the past 6 yrs. My point being, I have NEVER seen it this bad on any mmo to date. If this was about Oceanic servers or me being in Japan then why, pray tell, have I not seen this issue on all the other mmos I have played?

    Deny all you like, if WAR cannot deliver a decent pop on their servers then people will leave for inferior games that can.

    Regards

     

    Melmoth

     

    edited for spelling

     

  • Posted: 10/09/08 5:01 AM
    WAR (Warhammer Online)
• • Server Merges...Seriously

  • I play on European servers, but I live in Japan. So I am often on at off-peak.

    I have played different servers and Med-Med seems to be highest. But the highest just isn't enough off-peak.

    I love the style and content but I simply cannot play this game off-peak as it is a dead, empty world. It's unbelievable. I have never played an mmo this dead (off-peak) before. I play VGSOG, AOC, WOW, COH, COV, EVE, TS, SWG etc.

    What makes it worse is that this is meant to be a group pvp game, without people it is pointless.

    Seriously, address this or people like me (who really want it to succeed) will leave.

    To pre-empt, eager Fanbois who deny this as a serious issue are not helping this potentially ace license. 

    Regards

     

    Melmoth

  • Posted: 10/09/08 4:04 AM
    WAR (Warhammer Online)
• • Your cool WAR character names

  • Heya.

    So let's share some of our cool names! Some of mine are the same names I used in WOW and some are inspired by favourite characters from elsewhere. I will share 4 of them

    Goblin Shaman - Gankyspanky

    Fire Wizard - Hot luvin'

    Melmoth - of course from Melmoth the Wanderer, my fave gothic horror novel

    Smelldog - an old childhood insult, now used to name my Gobbo Squig herder

     

    Regards

     

    Melmoth

     

  • Posted: 10/03/08 9:09 AM
    WAR (Warhammer Online)
• • Bugs aside, which game is more fun? AoC or WAR?

  • The question of 'fun' of of course relative to your gaming tastes. If we can define those 'tastes' then we can provide an answer that helps the lurkers and fence-sitters make?up their minds.

    Firstly, if you are a "casual gamer" then both AOC and WAR have appeal. I would dearly love to win the lottery and retire to a life of hardcore gaming, but unfortunately I have to work in a profession that is extremely demanding of time. Not to mention my family. AOC and WAR are both casual friendly, AOC because it is very solo-friendly and WAR because grouping with others is so quick and easy to get into. Both games are "fun" in this sense, but I rate WAR moreso because I like grouping and pvping; WAR enables me to get in some group pvp even if I only have 30 mins to spare.

    AOC has pretty graphics and an amazing music score. If you have been playing Mass Effect, Crysis etc and anything less with spoil your fun then AOC is going to be for you. WAR, relative to these games, will look old and dated. Mass Effect, Crysis, etc are single player games too, so it wont bother you too much that AOC, for many players, is largely a solo game. AOC also has a combat-system that, unlike WAR, has more in common with Oblivion than WOW.  I think that AOC is going to be a really successful xbox game as a result.

    If fast-paced pvp and a wicked sense of humour is your desire then WAR gives AOC a bloody nose and then some. I played to level 65 in AOC and only grouped 4 times. Arena elites, Sanctum and some elite quests. I did try, many, many  times, to group in AOC but to no avail. I was also in 3 guilds: one collapsed and the second ione merged into another guild and even then there was no grouping. AOC, for me, was frustratingly solo, solo, solo. WAR is the opposite, within an hour of first playing WAR was in my first group; in fact, I group at least once in WAR for every hour played. Huge contrast with AOC btw.

    As someone else said, the lion's share of WAR content is pvp-centric and so the game's fun-factor is based as much upon players ingenuity as it is with new content. WAR players themselves - as they learn to play their classes better, learn to exploit enemy weaknesses and learn to work as a pvp team - will extend gameplay and provide more depth with the devs main responsibility to keep an eye on class balance etc. AOC had zero pvp appeal when I quit a month ago and the remaining content 65-80 had no appeal left for me as I wanted pvp and more grouping.

    Now the real clincher is this. I was a WOW player for about 4 years. I used to be hardcore before I became a high school teacher and then I had no time left. I switched to pvp in WOW and realised it was great fun, for me at least. I quit WOW because I was tired of the same-old same-old. I really love WAR for the same reason I loved WOW battlegrounds and for a similar wicked sense of humour. WAR is even more humorous - especially the Greenskins - than WOW. You like battlegrounds right, well WAR is that same appeal with bells, whistles, spikes and a million other pointy things poking in yer eyes. If you share my view then WAR is most definitely going to the most fun for you.

    The fun I derived from AOC was not an mmo, pvp fun btw. AOC fun was similar to the fun I had playing The Witcher or Mass Effect; solo fun with nice graphics and a good story but with no mmo, pvp appeal.

    I can see myself playing WAR for at least year or two btw. With AOC I knew it wouldnt last beyond one year.

    Regards

    Melmoth

  • Posted: 10/01/08 12:55 AM
    WAR (Warhammer Online)