*** Official Elder Scrolls MMO Thread ***

[Nemeses]

Preview/Review
http://lordmatt.co.uk/item/2445/

You know funny enough when talking to guild members on TS3 the one thing I kept coming back to is how lazy the game felt, lazy as in the making of the game.

Had quite a think and a few chats since I played it and I'm more of a mind now that I will not buy the game.

WS even with its faults is leaps and bounds ahead of this game, its funny had you asked me which game a year ago, I would never in a 100 years have chosen WS.

 

[Madeddie]

Visuals I thought were impresive but not entirely sure beside the visuals this is offering over existing MMO's, just seems the same old thing with better graphics being released a few years too late.

IMO Everquest Landmark / Next has more potential of being a sucess combining a MMO with simalar offering as Minecraft sandbox, i.e. destructible world , structural buildings - no server will look the same, Guess we will have to wait and see if SOE can deliver against their claim but certainly think the concept is more the step in the right direction for lasting apeal.

 

[TwsT]

Was put off at first but went roaming and found things a bit more challenging still didn't like the UI I like to see my XP level grow as i play not keep having to check it

 

[decampo]

Only managed about 30 minutes play time of this and was totally underwhelmed. Animation and combat were very sub standard and I also thought the graphics were disappointing too. Characters up close had very low res armor textures like when SW:TOR first released. Perhaps the game gets much better beyond the opening zones but I have serious reservations.

 

[Hixxy0]

Was put off at first but went roaming and found things a bit more challenging still didn't like the UI I like to see my XP level grow as i play not keep having to check it

Totally agree.

 

[Matson]

I actually started to enjoy it more once i got further along in the game and the visuals didn't seem so bad in the end. Especially when i swapped over to 4xEQ supersampling it looked quite nice. Nothing special but not too bad.
The quests so far didn't seem too interesting...nothing different from the usual boring go there collect this or kill that quests.
I do think 5 years of WOW might have spoiled most future MMO's as nothing has been as good since for me.
To be honest a good new MMO for me would be the WOW style of gameplay with an updated more realistic graphics engine.

 

[Gazanimal]

I managed a few hours on Friday night and basically it was a good looking game, with decent storyline but the multiplayer part of the game felt non-existent and I'd rather play Skyrim.

Definitely not going to purchase as I can see it nose-diving quicker than SW:TOR and that would be some achievement.

 

[Emjay86]

My guess is this will simply go down in the books as another failed MMO. I havn't in all my years beta testing played such a poorly made MMO. That may indeed sound harsh but all the others have at least kept my interest over a weekend of beta testing. The landscaping is nice but frankly you can get decent landscaping already in games such as GW2 and AoC it has a very clunky and clumsy combat/movement system and it tries too hard to copy Skyrim yet fails so poorly at it. Basically there are modding teams out there who would have done a far better job. I dare say there are mods on Skyrim that even now make it better.

My prediction is EQ Next will be the closest bet to a 'big' mmo release this year. Wildstar is nice and all but it looks a little TOO adventurous. Theres reinventing the wheel then theres throwing the wheel out altogether and starting from scratch...

 

[melmac]

Well, I tried it over the weekend too. Took ages to download and then took ages to login, got several crash to desktop, which I reported. So most of my time was spent logging in and out and waiting for my character to load.

I see from reading several of the previous posts in this thread that people were not really happy with the graphics in the game. I thought the look of the game was ok. Nothing special but nothing too bad either. For me, it's not something that would make or break an MMO as long as it doesn't like terrible.

So what did I think of the game in general? The way it is now, I couldn't recommend it at all. And this is from a guy who loves Skyrim and loves MMO type games, and I am pretty easy to please. There was too much wrong with this game. Movement felt like you were floating. Combat was terrible, I really felt like I wasn't connected to my weapons at all. distance was impossible to judge and I didn't feel like I was in control at all. If it's going to survive in PvP, the combat system will need a lot of work. The skyrim style of combat I don't will work in an MMO.

The other issue I had was with the UI, but I won't judge the game too harshly on this as I am sure this will be improved upon.

In it's current state it's a NO from me.

 

[Zethor]

I gave it a couple of hours in the weekend..

They took an incredibly rich and complex world and turned it into a generic MMO cr*p fest. Quest! Go to that cave. Kill baddies on the way by spamming clicks. Reach quest goal. Done. After 5 years of development, is that all the elite in the industry (Bethesda) has to offer?
I suppose this is what happens when companies create games with a single purpose in mind, to take a slice from the rival's pie, instead of doing it to provide entertainment for their customers.

The worst part about this mess is the behaviour of the developer as it has been doing anything possible to prevent people from expressing their views (be them biased or unbiased). The official/partner forums are heavily censored, articles on various sites and magazines are extremely vague, they're deleting posts left and right even on reddit..

Compare this, for example, with the months leading up to the release of Guild Wars 2. Reviews, previews and gameplay videos with commentary everywhere, debates etc. Not the case for EOS, they don't want publicity because they know the more people talk about their turd, the worse it will do on release.

This will be the bomb of the decade, not just the year and I really REALLY hope it's the final nail in the coffin of generic MMO's.

 

[Newbie007]

but but but, sub based games are great

 

[Omaeka]

I really REALLY hope it's the final nail in the coffin of generic MMO's.

I doubt it will be, WoW will still keep releasing expansions and keep obtaining subscribers so the generic MMO will always be there. For generic MMOs to die, all MMOS would need to fail besides TSW, TERA and GW2.

 

[Newbie007]

Depends what you mean by generic MMO's really. There is a place in the MMO space for a traditional themepark style game in addition to WOW imo. It just needs to be well polished & fun, 2 things ESO isnt, and the majority of releases since WoW haven't been. Wildstar just needs to polish up some aspects and have an engaging, well designed, fun end game and that will be a cracking 'generic' title.

Its no co-incidence that the most succesful MMO since WoW was well polished and fun, GW2.

 

[Tombstone]

but but but, sub based games are great

They some times are to be fair, so are some F2P ones.

My favourite MMOs ever were all sub based (UO, Daoc, EQ1) , although times were different then and the F2P model is more common these days.

(Having said that...I'd stump up a monthly sub in the blink of an eye for a UO2 or Daoc 2 )

 

[Tombstone]

Depends what you mean by generic MMO's really. There is a place in the MMO space for a traditional themepark style game in addition to WOW imo. It just needs to be well polished & fun, 2 things ESO isnt, and the majority of releases since WoW haven't been. Wildstar just needs to polish up some aspects and have an engaging, well designed, fun end game and that will be a cracking 'generic' title.

Its no co-incidence that the most succesful MMO since WoW was well polished and fun, GW2.

True...and I'm hoping that EQ Next can deliver in that regard

 

[Omaeka]

Depends what you mean by generic MMO's really. There is a place in the MMO space for a traditional themepark style game in addition to WOW imo. It just needs to be well polished & fun, 2 things ESO isnt, and the majority of releases since WoW haven't been. Wildstar just needs to polish up some aspects and have an engaging, well designed, fun end game and that will be a cracking 'generic' title.

Its no co-incidence that the most succesful MMO since WoW was well polished and fun, GW2.

Do you know of any properly informative vids for Wildstar? Cheers.

Now, IMO what TESO would be perfect for, would be a fantasy version of Second Life with combat. Think about it, questing and looting instead of a job, but being able to create your own businesses, employ people, build homes and generally offer something worthwhile doing that isn't just end game raids or PVP. If it was like Runescape but controls and looks like it does, it would have a very worthwhile claim to the MMO crown.

 

[Aedus]

[LateX'Dog]A subscription based model works guise! SRSLY![/LateX'Dog]

 

[MrMarvelous]

Wow so it is as bad as people are making it out to be. Do you guys think they'll go F2P with this or try and drag it out with a sub fee only for it to die later?

 

[Davepen]

I really think a lot of people here did not sink enough time into the game.


For me, the first couple of hours were pretty weak.


Went for a bow, combat seemed a bit flakey, not very exciting.

But as soon as I got to about level 8-9, the world opened up a lot, and I started to unlock some decent skills on the bow.

The skill trees look awesome as well, I liked the way you can choose to morph skills to provide a specific effect once you have them to a certain level.

For instance, with the bow, the volley skill where it rains down arrows, you get a choice of morphing this to have a wider range and aoe, or to rain down fire arrows.

I went with fire arrows (duh!) and had a lot of fun.


Also, I found that the fully zoomed out view (wow style) was much more enjoyable than first person for bow combat.

By the end of the beta I was begging for more, and I didnt even get to try any dungeons or PVP!

I think people should withhold judgement to more than just the first 5 levels, it really did seem to open up and improve a lot once you get based the starting areas

 

[Zethor]

I estimate it will be F2P within three to nine months as the blackslash from places such as forums, Metacritic user reviews etc, will be very difficult to deal with while sustaining sales/subs. In fact, even professional reviewers will probably give it a good bashing as the developers can't afford to stay friends with those mercenaries (as opposed to EA or Activision when they promote turds).

As for the end of generic MMO's, I will rephrase and say I hope this is the end of such games with huge budgets and long development cycles. It's a waste of time and resources that could be used to offer us various other products with much more potential.

For instance, with the bow, the volley skill where it rains down arrows, you get a choice of morphing this to have a wider range and aoe, or to rain down fire arrows.

I went with fire arrows (duh!) and had a lot of fun.


Also, I found that the fully zoomed out view (wow style) was much more enjoyable than first person for bow combat.

By the end of the beta I was begging for more, and I didnt even get to try any dungeons or PVP!

I think people should withhold judgement to more than just the first 5 levels, it really did seem to open up and improve a lot once you get based the starting areas

Question, did you stay in range with the bow or did you end up shooting arrows in the face of NPCs at point blank? Also, have you experienced other similar MMOs?