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

[richardboustead.livejournal.com]

Ahh...I remember WoW. Been clean three years now. And by 'clean' I mean I've transferred the addiction to other games.

Such as, you might want to give Star Trek Online a quick look. The customisation is massive- easily beating Oblivion hands down. And you can customise your Bridge Officers just as much. The interface is hugely scalable as well.

Controls take a little bit of getting used to, but ever since the Legacy of Romulus expansion, the tutorial/intros have gotten far better, both in terms of story and in instructions. It's Free To Play. The balance there is actually pretty good. You can even get all the paid stuff via in-game grinding, but that takes a long time.

Doesn't have the sheer player-base of WoW, but has it's own core audience of somewhere around 300k-400k.

Its fully possible to fly around in say, a gigantic indoor arena in a ship you named yourself - such as maybe "USS Skylark with Bridge Officers customised however you want them to look or be named. Maybe a First Officer with long blue hair named Ariane, or perhaps an engineer with a black beard named, say Marc. Possibilities are limitless.

What? No, I can't think what I might be referring to there and those suggestions are in no way based on actual experience. :P

[seawasp]

Hmm. That sounds intriguing, actually.

[ninjarat.livejournal.com]

I wanted to ponder this a bit before I wrote anything about the customization in STO vs. Elder Scrolls games.

See, STO, like most on-line games, doesn't really offer much customization at all. Sure, you have a wide variety of cosmetic options available but the very first game play affecting decision that you make is to put yourself into a box. That is, you have to pick a class from the MMO holy trinity: tank (engineer), healer (science) or damage (tactical). STO is a bit less restrictive than most MMOs in this regard but still, it's the holy trinity and you're stuck with it.

In Morrowind and Oblivion you do pick a class but the choice is not a box. It's a list of skills that your character is better than average for a player character. Several classes spit in the eyes of the old D&D tropes about how magic and weapons and armor don't mix. Skyrim does away with classes entirely, allowing players to switch up play styles at will without having to roll up new characters. Unless you want to do that, of course, and the mod "Alternate Start" makes that a lot of fun. My last play had me starting out as an Imperial Battlemage heading straight into the civil war. No, the game does not acknowledge that rank but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.