World of Warcraft...

[seawasp]

... actually downloaded and tried the free version for a bit yesterday. (Well, given how honkin' huge it is, I actually had downloaded it over the prior night).

I doubt I'll be playing it again. It's pretty enough, I guess, and the FMV to start it was impressive, but the controls suck (not surprising, I'm using a keyboard), the tutorial features aren't sufficient, the flexibility in creating a character was minimal, and the icons and text are printed in teeny-tiny print I can barely read even when holding the computer up near my face.

No character interaction or intro; I get more character in Oblivion. And the controls on the PS3 just are totally lightyears beyond anything on a keyboard. (yeah, I presume there's probably some awesome USB joysticks or something out there, but I don't have one).

But I'll leave it on my HD for a bit; I may change my mind and give it another shot. 

Comments

[argonel.livejournal.com]

I can't argue against your opinion, since I'm not you and it is specifically an opinion. However this does remind me that you are more of a console gamer than a PC gamer. Because I have been using them for around 20 years I find keyboard and mouse more natural than a gamepad and I don't know that there can be a decent gamepad control for warcraft.

This also reminds me how old fasioned World of Warcraft really is, and how much of the enjoyment really rests on playing with other like minded people. Unfortunately I think players on a free account are restricted from talking to and trading with paying players, so it can serve as an intro, but only as a solo experience.

I think you should give it another shot, but I don't expect that you will change your mind.

[seawasp]

Well, I probably will give it another shot, but the *teeny tiny print* is a major barrier. I really have to hold my laptop up to within about six to eight inches of my face sometimes, and that's really a pain.

The controls are annoying, but hey, I played through Escape Velocity Override and Nova perfectly well with just keyboard commands. I did my original gaming with keyboard commands (Sundog and Dungeon Master on the Atari ST).

But if the main draw is really interacting with people, and I can't interact with them, that's something of a showstopper.

[argonel.livejournal.com]

As a specific point for text size I set mine to a point where I was happy with it and it took me about 5 minutes to find where to change the option. To adjust the font size in the chat window right click on the tab title. the options are 12, 14,16,and 18 point text. Bumping it up to 18 might make it non minuscule on your laptop, 14 is reasonably comfortable on my 17" laptop.

[seawasp]

Are there more character choices if you're paid up? I chose "human" and it seemed they could only be one character class (priest or cleric or whatever it was); same for the others. Do you get to choose different classes?

[argonel.livejournal.com]

You should have more choices even in the free sample. Each race has around 6 or 8 different classes with 3 specializations per class. In the free version you probably can't play as a panda or access the death knight and monk classes, but everything else up to level 20 should be there.

IIRC on character creation the races are selected on one side of the screen while the classes are selected on the opposite side. I don't recall if they dim the classes you can't pick or hide them, but the choices should be available.

[seawasp]

Weird. I couldn't find any way to change any of the races; they had a default and there was no obvious way to change that. I'll try it again.