It is my opinion that ESO is very quickly becoming a MMOC (Massive Multiplayer Online Catastrophe) hence the low ratings.

I am a veteran MMO Gamer and had very high hopes for ESO when I saw it was being released on console. I waited impatiently for a long time for this game to come to console and I have to admit, I am a bit disappointed. The game mechanics, story-lines and GFX are outstanding and exactly what I would expect from Bethesda and Zenimax however the game-play is another story. I have seen thread after thread here where posters state that people playing this game have no idea what a MMOG is. While I find those comments true I should also point out that I do not think Bethesda/Zenimax know what a MMOG is either. As far as the players ... let's face it. MANY of these lunatics are COD and Battlefield run-and-gunners who try to apply that game-play mentality here and sorry to say, that is a recipe for idiocy and disaster! As for Zenimax and Bethesda ... they made this game so those madmen could implement the "run-and-gun" mentality here. SMH

Example: Public Dungeons/Delves and MOST quests are a complete joke here. They need to make these SOLO-Instances badly. You can go to any quest and when you start it you immediately see other players (often gangs of very low-level players who should not even BE in that area yet) running all over the place and killing the NPCs and bosses over and over and over again trying to rank-up. Sadly, I haven't got more than 2 hits on most of the bosses I engage due to the huge number of "padders" standing there waiting for them to respawn so they can kill them again and again and again. These players could not tell you the story-line of ANY quest much less the game in general if their lives depended on it ... they are clueless dummies who just run around and try to kill and rank-up as fast as they can. I often see high level players (lvl 41-48) leading a gang of lvl 5-10 players through lvl 30 areas to rank them up and that is just ridiculous. The curse of "instant gratification" strikes again! Myself and a great number of other veteran MMOG'rs play these games for the story lines as well as the CHALLENGE of the quests, dungeons, delves and combat but this game is being destroyed and our game play experience is being tainted by these mindless, clueless, inconsiderate hordes of "padders" invading, camping in and destroying our quests. There is however a "cure" to this issue and a rather simple one at that. Make all major storyline quests solo-instances. Also do like WOW did and make it so that players HAVE TO stay within the boundaries of their level by restricting higher level areas to players of those levels. Example: Reapers March is a lvl 30+ area and a lvl 30 will have trouble there solo. Make that a lvl 30-40 play area and nobody under lvl 30 can enter the area PERIOD. Classify areas by level and you will solve a lot of these problems. Also, these run-and-gunners ONLY care about leveling and couldn't care less about story lines OR other players game experience. Ok, fine ... make arena combat areas where they can go fight and earn loot and gold and level to their hearts content while the rest of us who have a clue play the game the way it was designed and meant to be played.

Ratings are 99% determined from out-of-the-box experience. As a retail MMO ages its OOBE gets worse because you're basically paying $60 or so for a game that is unplayable without major patching.

The only way around it is to discontinue the quickly-obsolete physical copies and exclusively offer up-to-date online sales every Tuesday (after the patch is verified as stable). That way a player starting tonight would just pay for the game and then download ESOTU v2.0.12.

Otherwise, the first impression is, "still waiting to play this."

Soulshine wrote: »

Zadaris2021 wrote: »

So I am really digging this game and so is my friend. This MMO is very well done, and that's coming from a 2007-2011 WoW player, and some of Mists as well. I hit WoW very hard and enjoyed the raiding content, showing up and leading raids from 7p-12a five nights a week...it was a job basically. This game is giving me a good bit of satisfaction so far, and I'm on PS4. Also, combat mechanics and speccing characters is very in depth and important, bringing tons of strategy and theory-crafting. But, I have one question: Why is ESO getting bad reviews? I'm curious if reviewers actually play MMO's past level 10 even, or 20. Do reviewers legitimately play a MMO, raid and do everything to even a slight degree, or do they scratch the surface and base their review on that?

If you have actually got raiding experience as you say, then you will need to come back here and visit your own remarks once you get to end game content in this game - such as it is. I have been here since beta, and can tell you the 1-50 game is not the issue. For those of us still waiting for something other than grinding champion points and rolling alts to fiddle with, the game got stale quite a while ago. My own solution was to re-roll onto EU from NA and re-experience the game there with other folks as a diversion until (and IF) such time as we actually get the repeatedly promised and repeatedly delayed updates to vet level content, itemization, PvP, etc.

Yeah I have experienced very high level, competitive content on WoW. The things I did on that game I would find hard for a lot of the player base I see running around on MMO's today. Me and my friend have been wondering about whether the end-game will fall short in this game. To read your comment solidifying the idea scares me

I would give this game an 8 or 9 all day long but...no text chat equals poor communication so it gets a 4.

mdhammond wrote: »

Well the crap ratings on console are bc you can't play half the time due to server issues in NA , and when u can the lag is unbearable sometimes

What are you talking about? I think I've seen you on other threads down talking the game as well. I've had 0 problems with the servers... the servers go down for maintenance, but that's part of it being an MMO.

Ixtyr wrote: »

reviewers are not in the business of giving a fair, honest, and completely legitimate review of any title they look at. They're in the business of entertaining and captivating their audience to generate as much traffic as possible, since that generates them revenue. Knee-jerk reactions and hopping on a bandwagon to find something to hate or get angry about in a new title helps to get and keep the attention of a large audience - while being fair, honest, and completely transparent is boring. It's no different than any media outlet, and it's an extension of our own poor behavior as consumers. Unfortunate, but true.

Spot on. I've pointed this out myself in similar threads. Angry Joe is a perfect example. He wouldn't have nearly as much publicity if his show was called "Happy Joe".

You do tend to vote low when after installation it doesn't work as promised

Zadaris2021 wrote: »

So I am really digging this game and so is my friend. This MMO is very well done, and that's coming from a 2007-2011 WoW player, and some of Mists as well. I hit WoW very hard and enjoyed the raiding content, showing up and leading raids from 7p-12a five nights a week...it was a job basically. This game is giving me a good bit of satisfaction so far, and I'm on PS4. Also, combat mechanics and speccing characters is very in depth and important, bringing tons of strategy and theory-crafting. But, I have one question: Why is ESO getting bad reviews? I'm curious if reviewers actually play MMO's past level 10 even, or 20. Do reviewers legitimately play a MMO, raid and do everything to even a slight degree, or do they scratch the surface and base their review on that?

The dev support in this game is absolute garbage. Bugs go months without being fixed. Its been a year since any new content has been released. And PvP remains incredibly unbalanced.

jamesharv2005ub17_ESO wrote: »

Want solo instances load Skyrim.

Actually Witcher 3 is my preferred, out of bed experience

Alphashado wrote: »

The game is very solid in most aspects. When compared to the average MMO, it's one of the best. The biggest problem is that ESO has an identity crisis. It doesn't know if it's an MMO or if it's a single player RPG. Neither do the developers or half the customers. Almost everything about this game stems from people expecting more from an MMO, or people expecting single player environments like every other ES game they have played.

It tries to satisfy both target audiences, and by doing so leaves both types of player slightly disappointed. People expect nothing but the very best from such a storied franchise with millions of fans world wide.

Some questionable developmental decisions coupled with the above mentioned identity crisis has led to some bad reviews.

The bar was set too high right out of the gate.

^This. It can't be said any better. Every thread is like a tug of war between the two identities. I just wish they (ZOS) would pick one and be done with it. Even if that meant *I* would need to find another game for what I'm after. But please stop half arsing it and trying to appease everyone, it's not possible.

mdhammond wrote: »

Well the crap ratings on console are bc you can't play half the time due to server issues in NA , and when u can the lag is unbearable sometimes

While I have had lag, most of that problem was immediately after launch and really isn't much if a problem now. I've had some laggy experiences since the past two weeks I've been playing, but nothing too horrible. It's being dealt with as I can see

why are you surprised? Game is grinder, abuser, hacker paradise. The day they decide killing mobs give you good xp and questing low exp, they literally destroy integrity of this game. When new player become veteran rank1, almost everything in this game is big slap into his face. And until now, zenimax dont care, because of consoles launch....

I believe it was a retalitation, GW2 and SWTOR was so overhyped so the genre just wasnt ready for ESO so fast. I dont think its truly recoverd from it even today, genre isnt just what it used to be. even one famous MMO site was shut down, oh the drama.