Thoughts on my first MMO I bought on launch

tawok

TetsuMaru wrote: »

See how easy it was to find this information. Lol. Thanks guys. Far from the worst launch ever and in my experience its honestly one of the best and most stable. Call me a fan boy if you want lol. I enjoy this game immensely.

Discussion via forum is a much more entertaining catalyst for information. I got my info, and healthy discussion to boot.

Continue.

Thalmar

Actually i am an older gamer in terms of age and i play RPG and MMOs maybe longer than many of the gamers' real age. I find ESO incredibly fun if you stop thinking about so called end-game. I am not a type of person when i eat icecream thinking about what will i do after it finishes, i mostly enjoy the icecream itself. If we don't consider bots and bugs game totally satisfied me.

Actually my only concern is, while people who likes the game enjoying it, the people who searches for end-game because they finsihed all content by skipping many things by rushing in 1 month, complaining about the lack of end-game will lead the developers' only focus in the favor of this one type of players. End-game focused MMOs feeds the elitists ego and ignores the RP side of the MMOs. I am just hoping developers will not make this mistake and will not consider the complaints. One last sentence i could advise; enjoy the icecream...

RomedyMC

@Audigy - That. So much that. All of that. I love that so much I would marry it and have an entire family of little thats.

vyndral13preub18_ESO

tawok wrote: »

Guys, I didn't mean to make this topic to start a flame war over whether or not this should clone wow. I'm simply opening discussion on whether or not other MMOs launch this poorly, and I'd really like some concrete examples.

GW2. Their end game was designed around running through all the areas you had not done and collecting achievements. A large portion of their end game was also high level dynamic events. A large portion of them were broken at launch and would 'lock up' making the events never happen until a server reboot. Some of the events still break today. Not to long after launch bots infested high levels and event trains were set up, as a result, Gw2 nerfed their own end game into the ground. Later repetitive dungeons to run were installed as end game and the loot grind with it.

Also at launch it was near impossible to group, since due to their overflow system, you could not get to the people in your group since you might be in different instances of the world. You could try to travel to you party but this hardly ever worked. The good side was that this was an actual bug and eventually fixed. The phasing in eso was a design decision and will take longer.

Guild drop off happens in every game. People rush to make guilds and invite everyone they see, after the first month the large drop off in players leave empty many guilds since every tom *** and harry made one.

mutharex

@vyndral13preub18_ESO‌ yep.

*Edited: Flaming*

tawok

Audigy wrote: »

snip

Alright, I'll bite.

"End-game is a really flawed MMO concept. MMO´s don't have an end, that's the whole idea of that franchise. If you play an MMO then not to see the end, but to enter a journey that takes you to different parts in that gaming world."

You say yourself down below that

"All games offer a similar system past max level (UO doesn't even have levels), all take months to climb up the ranks and unlock abilities, yet at least Ultima and DAOC are considered the crème de la crème in MMO history."

Considered crème de la crème, with functional systems to continue the game after it "ends". Sounds like the bar setters had a way to play after the story ends. Imagine that.

"Elder Scrolls is not about running the same raid for months, its about exploring and discovering new things. "

What happens when we run out of "new things"? Make a new character and see it again? That's a flawed design concept if you ask me, from a longevity standpoint. That's why we have trials with leaderboards.

"The main idea behind grouping at ESO is the open world social system. You do not need to spam a channel, or an invite button here. No! All the grouping can and does happen on the fly."

That doesn't happen, unless you poke them with a stick. Is it asking too much to have actual group activities other than instanced dungeons? Don't even pretend like the faceroll public bosses/dolmens/delves are grouped activities. Why is it, that when I play other MMOs, it seems beneficial to be in a group?

"Players find each other by just exploring the game, this is a totally different approach to WoW or other "invite only" MMO´s."

How is it any different than any other MMO? I can run into other players out and about while exploring, and randomly message/invite them to group. It's got the "I get credit if I touch a mob no matter what group I'm in" technology. That's extremely anti-social tech, and only serves to reinforce my point about soloing being advantageous to grouping.

"they are the typical hoppers that consume MMO`s and not play them."

So consuming a game is different than playing it?

"What you say doesn't make any sense to be honest. Just because something takes a while, its bad?"

It made sense, if you took the time to comprehend my post. Never did I say something taking a while makes it bad. Imagine for a moment, that any other MMO had you complete 90% of your character progression in 100 hours. To do the other 10% of character progression, you have to put up 200 more hours. Doesn't that seem like a nose dive in progression to you? All other MMOs ramp up, ESO takes an elevator.

"Your problem however is, that you don't like the concept of the game. But this is nothing ZO can fix, its your attitude towards the franchise that might need some readjustments if you want to get happy with MMO´s in the future."

You keep saying franchise, but context clues say you mean genre. My attitude towards the genre doesn't need to change. I'll just change the game I'm playing if it doesn't suit my tastes, plain and simple. Since other MMOs don't find it necessary to say "Well, it's not targeted at you", I'll play a game that does. That's the only excuse I can find on any site regarding this game. Anytime someone voices disappointment, concern, or anger towards this game, it's not "targeted at them".

ESO is targeted at making money and drawing in WoW subscribers, like it or not. If their supposed "target" isn't enough to keep the doors open, they might need to rethink their "target".

"What WoW does and did, is in the process of dieing."

According to every MMO launch in the past 9 years, WoW and it's methodologies has been "dying" for it's entire lifespan. Yet, 7m subscribers disagree. Numbers don't lie.

"Games that go back to the roots of MMO´s by adding time related improvements - this is the future in my opinion."

Your whole post was an opinion, and you're entitled to it.

tawok

mutharex wrote: »

@vyndral13preub18_ESO‌ yep people seem to have very short and selective memories

Yeah, pretend like you're so innocent. Typical.

dietlime

tawok wrote: »

I'm not going to be one of those guys, that sits here and says that "X MMO was just as bad at launch!". I'm just going to tell you, as a person who has played many MMOs far past their launch, what my experience has been like buying on the ground floor.

My main points: End game, grouping, guilds/player drop-off, and VR.

End game: Where is it? Do most MMOs launch with almost nothing? Craglorn is coming, but I honestly can't see it lasting longer than 3 months, even for the more casual players.

Grouping: I'm a big believer in "if you want to group, be the leader", but it's pretty tough in a game that doesn't really give incentive to group. Due to phasing/instancing issues, it's almost more advantageous to solo.

Guilds/Player drop-off: This is something I'm not experienced in. But, it seems like in all my guilds, we've lost at least 80% prime time activity, to a 95% decrease in activity in one of my guilds. Guilds aside, my friends list has gone from 6-7 people online at prime time, to 0.

VR: It's been beaten to death, but VR sucks. Progression takes a nose dive, and all sense of reward with questing with it. Everyone I know that made it to VR, gave up around VR2, my highest friend made it to VR4 before quitting.

I'm still playing, and trying to enjoy myself, but these issues are glaring. The main point, and question: Is this normal for launch MMOs, or has this one really dropped the ball? It's hard to enjoy myself when it seems like a grand majority of the player base has already moved on, rendering my friends and guild lists empty, and myself feeling like I'm playing (dot)hack.

Did it occur to you that the point in this game is that playing it is fun, not trying to get the most godlike endgame gear?

What do you do in ANY game once you're unstoppable?

Stare at your legendaries?

tawok

dietlime wrote: »

tawok wrote: »

I'm not going to be one of those guys, that sits here and says that "X MMO was just as bad at launch!". I'm just going to tell you, as a person who has played many MMOs far past their launch, what my experience has been like buying on the ground floor.

My main points: End game, grouping, guilds/player drop-off, and VR.

End game: Where is it? Do most MMOs launch with almost nothing? Craglorn is coming, but I honestly can't see it lasting longer than 3 months, even for the more casual players.

Grouping: I'm a big believer in "if you want to group, be the leader", but it's pretty tough in a game that doesn't really give incentive to group. Due to phasing/instancing issues, it's almost more advantageous to solo.

Guilds/Player drop-off: This is something I'm not experienced in. But, it seems like in all my guilds, we've lost at least 80% prime time activity, to a 95% decrease in activity in one of my guilds. Guilds aside, my friends list has gone from 6-7 people online at prime time, to 0.

VR: It's been beaten to death, but VR sucks. Progression takes a nose dive, and all sense of reward with questing with it. Everyone I know that made it to VR, gave up around VR2, my highest friend made it to VR4 before quitting.

I'm still playing, and trying to enjoy myself, but these issues are glaring. The main point, and question: Is this normal for launch MMOs, or has this one really dropped the ball? It's hard to enjoy myself when it seems like a grand majority of the player base has already moved on, rendering my friends and guild lists empty, and myself feeling like I'm playing (dot)hack.

Did it occur to you that the point in this game is that playing it is fun, not trying to get the most godlike endgame gear?

What do you do in ANY game once you're unstoppable?

Stare at your legendaries?

Oh totally dude. I find myself logging in to WoW in my free few hours every night just to oogle at orange and purple pixels. Fun? Last thing on my mind in a game. I definitely don't have a different idea of fun as you, apparently known as "subjective" (*** liberals and their stupid words)

Did it occur to you that you could read my post instead of assuming that I'm just another rusher that's bitching about end game?

Did it occur to you there's better ways to communicate with people other than being a passive aggressive ass?

Thanks for the constructive comment, I'll be looking to you as a voice of logic and reason in the future!

dietlime

tawok wrote: »

mutharex wrote: »

TetsuMaru wrote: »

"End game" most nonsecuidor concept ever. My desire to grind the same content repeatedly in order to obtain gear that will be useless upon an expac release is completely gone. Games have endings....so do stories. Release more content that promotes building relationships with other players instead. Just my opinion.....fire away.

Totally agree, gear grinds are pointless compared to horizontal growth and REAL content. There are plenty of wowclones that cater to that mentality, let's not try turning this into rubbish too. Not all MMOs have to be carbon copies of wow, this tries to do something different. That you like it or not is completely irrelevant

Irrelevant to you, sure. Just like your opinion is irrelevant to me, except I'm not so rude as to explicitly tell you so.

If 800,000 subscribers say they want faceroll, gear grinds, and only 200k say they don't, whose opinion becomes relevant to ZoS? Craglorn and the trials are the first steps towards giving the hardcore, endgame farmers something to do, and good for them. Anything ZoS does to earn/keep subs is ok with me.

Any opinion you have is automatically invalidated; you based what's good based on what's popular.

tawok

*Edited: Flamming*

dietlime

ZOS has stated their goal for the game is around 200,000 players.

They're here to make a good game, not to pander to forum trolls or World of Warcraft players. I had a lot of fun questing today.

If you don't enjoy the game, leave. It's that simple. Not every game is going to be tailored the way you want it to be, and the sooner you accept that the more fun your time spent playing video games is going to be.

I find questing way more fun than clearing the same instance over and over hoping for a 1 in 1000 drop or whatever.

dietlime

The only holier-than-thou is you, posting this thread decrying the game as bad because you personally don't like it.

tawok

dietlime wrote: »

ZOS has stated their goal for the game is around 200,000 players

They're here to make a good game, not to pander to forum trolls or World of Warcraft players. I had a lot of fun questing today.

If you don't enjoy the game, leave. It's that simple. Not every game is going to be tailored the way you want it to be, and the sooner you accept that the more fun your time spent playing video games is going to be.

I find questing way more fun than clearing the same instance over and over hoping for a 1 in 1000 drop or whatever.

Source?

Thanks for letting me know what you find fun. That has a huge impact on what other people find fun. Please, tell me, do you think pizza tastes good?

tawok

*Edited: Flamming*

dietlime

Enjoy having your comments removed. The fact that you immediately devolve to personal attacks only further proves my point.

If you don't like the game, I'm sorry. There are lots of games I don't like. I don't think they're bad games for that reason. I don't go out of my way to accost the people who like those games just because they don't enjoy what I do. Gaming is a large and diverse culture.

Some of the most iconic and long-standing games of all time have fewer than 100,000 regular players.

Swampster

dietlime wrote: »

I find questing way more fun than clearing the same instance over and over hoping for a 1 in 1000 drop or whatever.

You don't see the problem with the questing/no endgame model though?

Players simply consume content far quicker than they can provide it.. once you're out of quests/story/map to explore what then?

dietlime

tawok wrote: »

dietlime wrote: »

ZOS has stated their goal for the game is around 200,000 players

They're here to make a good game, not to pander to forum trolls or World of Warcraft players. I had a lot of fun questing today.

If you don't enjoy the game, leave. It's that simple. Not every game is going to be tailored the way you want it to be, and the sooner you accept that the more fun your time spent playing video games is going to be.

I find questing way more fun than clearing the same instance over and over hoping for a 1 in 1000 drop or whatever.

Source?

Thanks for letting me know what you find fun. That has a huge impact on what other people find fun. Please, tell me, do you think pizza tastes good?

It was said in an interview with Matt Frior before the game was released, I am having trouble finding it now. It was part of what attracted me to the game. He said something like "we're out there trying to make a fun game" and that's a step in the right direction in my eyes. He suggested that they weren't worried about subscribing millions of people.

Too many of the recent releases I have played have focused on being popular to the point of pandering to streamers and pro gamers and that culture and have just been a drag to play as a regular homebody with a half dozen friends.

tawok

dietlime wrote: »

Enjoy having your comments removed. The fact that you immediately devolve to personal attacks only further proves my point.

If you don't like the game, I'm sorry. There are lots of games I don't like. I don't think they're bad games for that reason. I don't go out of my way to accost the people who like those games just because they don't enjoy what I do. Gaming is a large and diverse culture.

Some of the most iconic and long-standing games of all time have fewer than 100,000 regular players.

That's your choice to not comment on games you've spent your hard earned money on. That's such an idiotic and absurd thing to say, that a consumer isn't supposed to voice displeasure in a product that doesn't meet their standards. I'm not "going out of my way", I actually enjoy the game (despite your assumption of my OPs content, another suggestion to go back and actually read it ) and I spend time here discussing the game I still spend my spare time playing.

"Some of the most iconic and long-standing games of all time have fewer than 100,000 regular players."

Yes, and they have less than 10 employees or less (or none) continually working on and improving it. Prove me wrong.

mutharex

How many times you need to be reported before you stop insulting people who disagree with you tawok? Chill, because forum suspensions have effect on the game account as well

Swampster

mutharex wrote: »

How many times you need to be reported before you stop insulting people who disagree with you tawok? Chill, because forum suspensions have effect on the game account as well

I havent seen him write anything worse than he's been receiving in this thread..

tawok

dietlime wrote: »

It was said in an interview with Matt Frior before the game was released, I am having trouble finding it now. It was part of what attracted me to the game. He said something like "we're out there trying to make a fun game" and that's a step in the right direction in my eyes. He suggested that they weren't worried about subscribing millions of people.

Too many of the recent releases I have played have focused on being popular to the point of pandering to streamers and pro gamers and that culture and have just been a drag to play as a regular homebody with a half dozen friends.

I'm happy to see that quote when/if you find it.

Companies pander to streamers and pro gamers because it sells games 100x times faster than pandering to fan boys and vocal minorities. If any of the major YouTubers or Twitchers played, enjoyed, and published a good review on this game, we wouldn't see 1/10th of the negativity we seem to be plagued with.

It's mob mentality. The majority is too stupid to think for themselves, so they base their buying decision on what Idiot Joe, pewd, or machinima say. Is it right? Hell no. Reality? You betcha.

dietlime

I'd really like to see permanent forum bans start. Tawok spends more time here than in the game, and I would know from experience, it would be for his own good to be permanently banned.

I didn't recognize the name until you pointed it out. He's been doing this since before the game came out. On Reddit, too.

I used to be that guy Tawok, move on: it isn't worth it.

tawok

mutharex wrote: »

How many times you need to be reported before you stop insulting people who disagree with you tawok? Chill, because forum suspensions have effect on the game account as well

Dude, you wanna talk chill? I made a well written post with no anger, vitriol, or agenda behind it. I even kept my cool making it through the first wave. But eventually, you stop trying to be nice and cordial and you give in kind.

Don't pretend like you didn't get yourself reported there too, Jack. Your own advice, take it.

devolutedub17_ESO

If you can't handle a game with little to no end game or bugs, don't be a first adopter of an MMO. If you want to help shape where the game goes and see where the journey takes you, then by all means take the ride from the start. But, remember that if you want to make it better, constructive criticism will be more useful than accusations.

Getting mad at other players isn't constructive.

so, my thoughts? It seems to be a fine launch, this would be my fifth MMO I played from launch. There are issues that will get resolved. There are ideas that will be added and reworked. I'm not seeing anything that is insurmountable forthe dev team. Would I like some things to be corrected, added, fixed more quickly? Of course, but I also understand it's not that simple.

mutharex

tawok wrote: »

mutharex wrote: »

How many times you need to be reported before you stop insulting people who disagree with you tawok? Chill, because forum suspensions have effect on the game account as well

Dude, you wanna talk chill? I made a well written post with no anger, vitriol, or agenda behind it. I even kept my cool making it through the first wave. But eventually, you stop trying to be nice and cordial and you give in kind.

Don't pretend like you didn't get yourself reported there too, Jack. Your own advice, take it.

Well no, I didn't. Guess why? Because I gave you answers, no jokes or insults. The only post that was deleted was the one where I called you out and only because it quoted your post. Go figure!

Phantax

tawok wrote: »

I'm not going to be one of those guys, that sits here and says that "X MMO was just as bad at launch!". I'm just going to tell you, as a person who has played many MMOs far past their launch, what my experience has been like buying on the ground floor.

My main points: End game, grouping, guilds/player drop-off, and VR.

End game: Where is it? Do most MMOs launch with almost nothing? Craglorn is coming, but I honestly can't see it lasting longer than 3 months, even for the more casual players.

Grouping: I'm a big believer in "if you want to group, be the leader", but it's pretty tough in a game that doesn't really give incentive to group. Due to phasing/instancing issues, it's almost more advantageous to solo.

Guilds/Player drop-off: This is something I'm not experienced in. But, it seems like in all my guilds, we've lost at least 80% prime time activity, to a 95% decrease in activity in one of my guilds. Guilds aside, my friends list has gone from 6-7 people online at prime time, to 0.

VR: It's been beaten to death, but VR sucks. Progression takes a nose dive, and all sense of reward with questing with it. Everyone I know that made it to VR, gave up around VR2, my highest friend made it to VR4 before quitting.

I'm still playing, and trying to enjoy myself, but these issues are glaring. The main point, and question: Is this normal for launch MMOs, or has this one really dropped the ball? It's hard to enjoy myself when it seems like a grand majority of the player base has already moved on, rendering my friends and guild lists empty, and myself feeling like I'm playing (dot)hack.

You should be lucky its your first launch MMO. Lets see... I've done TERA, SWTOR, Secret World, Rift (all have been early access) and I can honestly say this has been the best and the worst of them.
The game itself is great, the new content schedule (assuming they stick to it) is very promising, latency is good (although not for some)
The bots and bugs at launch have been the worst I've seen (of any launch or expansion)
All-in-all ESO launch has been a positive (just) and for now anyway I see my gaming future here !

dietlime

You reported him for what? For pointing out that you devolved to ad-hominem attacks as soon as someone disagreed with you, without making any personal attacks himself?

tawok

dietlime wrote: »

I'd really like to see permanent forum bans start. Tawok spends more time here than in the game, and I would know from experience, it would be for his own good to be permanently banned.

I didn't recognize the name until you pointed it out. He's been doing this since before the game came out. On Reddit, too.

I used to be that guy Tawok, move on: it isn't worth it.

Actually, I spend a lot of time stopping by the official forums, the subreddit, and tamriel forge on downtime at work. It's my choice how to use my time, not yours.

You would know from experience? Seriously? Do you know how idiotic that sounds, at all?? You don't know me in real life, or even in game for that matter, how the hell would you know how much I play?

You used to be that guy? I'd rather be "that guy", than be the guy that pretends he "knows people" from how/what they do on the internet. Grow up.

dietlime

You know, just because I bought a game and it turned out to not be quite what I'd hoped for doesn't make my going on a childish tirade about it any more classy. Sure, I have the right to make myself look like that, but at some point you learn not to.

I bought Titanfall. Penny Arcade described it as "perfect." Suffice to say I feel it's far from perfect and should have kept my $85. Water under the bridge.

There will be another $85.