WoW: MoP or Guild Wars 2

[katmai]

MoP pre-ordered.

Holding off on Pre ordering as might be off at work when games comes out.

[Martinus]

GW2's release is one month ahead of MoP so will preorder MoP only if it turns out GW2 sucks.

[frunk]

This is probably the most comprehensive single post on GW2 I've seen.

[Martinus]

If GW2 does not suck, Blizzard could be in big trouble.

[katmai]

Some rumblings as such with the subscriptions dropping to 9million and vivendi trying to sell activision.

[Martinus]

Some rumblings as such with the subscriptions dropping to 9million and vivendi trying to sell activision.

I read somewhere that 90-95% of Blizzard's revenue comes from WoW subscription fees. If that cash cow goes, it's gonna hurt.

[Sophie Scholl]

It's not like it's going to disappear overnight.  I'm fairly certain they're already quite deep into a successor of some form or other.

[frunk]

Some rumblings as such with the subscriptions dropping to 9million and vivendi trying to sell activision.

Vivendi's been trying to sell for a while, probably due to other financial problems rather than difficulties at activision.

[frunk]

In game screenshots from the latest beta weekend.

[Martinus]

In game screenshots from the latest beta weekend.

I really like that the zoom level one plays at is closer than in Guild Wars - I think, largely, this is the reason I don't like some of the other games - the zoom out is so far, the character looks small and unrealistic.

[Jaron]

Someone says Blizzard is "in trouble" every time a new mmo launches. Prediction: after one-two weeks of playing you'll complain of motion sickness or some such nonsense and you will be a Panda bear.

[Martinus]

I participated in the stress test today and this game is really amazing. Plus no dizziness. I'm in. 

[Martinus]

Ok, so this game is really fun, based on the 2+ hours I was able to play yesterday.

frunk already did a good summary so I will just list some key features that stand out compared to WoW:

- most quests on the main map are essentially "join as you go" - there are no questgivers etc. of any kind - as you approach the relevant location (e.g. a field overrun by giant worms), you get a message that you are supposed to kill them and there is a bar filling up to show your progress - everyone in the area who contributes helps you fill the bar;

- from a WoW perspective, you are pretty much assumed to be in the party with all players in vicinity - your buffs and heals affect them, your protection aegis protects them, when someone near you is "downed" (see below) the game alerts you to it and lets you heal them;

- when you are "killed", you don't die/respawn immediately, but are "downed" which allows you to actually pull yourself up/kill enemies around you with a limited number of damage and self-heal abilities; if you are still overcome, you respawn at the nearest waypoint;

- the map is filled with waypoints and travel to them is instanteous - e.g. if you click on a waypoint that you previously visited on the map, you pay a small fee and are immediately teleported to it - so no more heartstone with just one place to teleport to - there is also no cooldown;

- speaking of the map, the game caters to "explorer/achiever" type of player more than any other MMORPG I played - the map is filled with "points of interest" and "vistas" which give you xp points/achievements for finding them, with a small cutscene (usually showing the location from a bird's view or some such) as a reward;

- cities are... well... cities, not small amusement parks pretending to be cities; the human capital, Divinity's Reach, is huge, filled with people who go about their business, talk etc.;

- the "events" quests are fun, especially as players from the whole area are alerted and come to help - so you have this horde of players for example escorting a courier between two outposts, while centaurs attack etc.;

- personal story quests are a different beast - they essentially are completed in instanced locations, so it's not that you have 20 other players in the same area who are also looking for their long lost sister or crap like that - essentially, the game balances this pretty nicely - you are surrounded by other people most of the time, but in your personal quest you are alone (though I suspect you could have your actual party members join);

- no more "not enough action bars" which I love - you get lots of skills but they are grouped into categories and you can only use that much at a given time (specifically, you get 5 skills that are directly affected by your weapon - for example my guardian gets direct damage and aoe damage spells when wielding a 2-handed hammer, but more protective and healing stuff when wielding a mace and a shield - these weapon skills are immutable, i.e. they only change when you equip different weapons); you then get one slot for a healing spell (out of 3 - usually, but depending on the class, some sort of powerful self-heal, weaker aoe heal etc.); three skills selected from 30 which are mainly influenced by class (you learn these skills with xp points but you can essentially end up buying all - but you can only use 3 at a given time); and one skill that is "elite" racial or class skill (which is very powerful, from maybe 5 or 6 available to each class/race combination - e.g. Norn can change into animals or stuff);

- combat is very dynamic, hardly any spell requires you to stand still, except when it makes sense (e.g. my guardian, when using a shield, can cast this huge "magic barrier" dome around him when he just kneels on the ground and protects all allies in the radius - he can't move while doing so), you can dodge, roll on the ground, jump and whatnot;

- animation is very smooth (and I'm playing this on my iMac with Windows installed through bootcamp, so nothing fancy), and the characters are big enough not to seem weird; and the graphics is very pretty, with a stylized water colour look rather than being "pseudo-realistic";

- everything is accessible on the road (except for vendors, I think) - so you can put items on AH from anywhere in the world; you can respec/change your skills etc;

All in all, I think for the first time since the launch of WoW, I found a game that would make me switch. From previous games, if you liked the graphics of LotRO, but were annoyed by the game mechanics being too "old style MMORPG", this is the game for you.

[frunk]

- when you are "killed", you don't die/respawn immediately, but are "downed" which allows you to actually pull yourself up/kill enemies around you with a limited number of damage and self-heal abilities; if you are still overcome, you respawn at the nearest waypoint;

Even if you are fully defeated and asked to respawn you can still be revived by another player if you are willing to wait.

- the map is filled with waypoints and travel to them is instanteous - e.g. if you click on a waypoint that you previously visited on the map, you pay a small fee and are immediately teleported to it - so no more heartstone with just one place to teleport to - there is also no cooldown;

Travel by waypoint inside of cities is free, but otherwise the cost increases as the distance increases.  From some of the major cities there are also Asura Gates which are free to use and take you to other far away locations.  Access to PvP or WvW can be done through these Asura Gates (if you want to stay in character) or by a menu item in the top left.

- personal story quests are a different beast - they essentially are completed in instanced locations, so it's not that you have 20 other players in the same area who are also looking for their long lost sister or crap like that - essentially, the game balances this pretty nicely - you are surrounded by other people most of the time, but in your personal quest you are alone (though I suspect you could have your actual party members join);

Yes, they can.  The personal story is also completely optional to do.  You can ignore it and play the whole rest of the game instead.

- everything is accessible on the road (except for vendors, I think) - so you can put items on AH from anywhere in the world; you can respec/change your skills etc;

Vendors, cross character storage areas and crafting stations aren't available anywhere.  You also have a crafting storage area.  In your inventory there's a dropdown where you can place all of your crafting items in this storage area.  It means you almost never have to go back just because you run out of inventory space.


There's another stress tonight from 7-11 pm EST.

[Martinus]

Vendors, cross character storage areas and crafting stations aren't available anywhere.  You also have a crafting storage area.  In your inventory there's a dropdown where you can place all of your crafting items in this storage area.  It means you almost never have to go back just because you run out of inventory space.

Oh didn't know that - I ran out of inventory space yesterday. 

In any case, as travel is instanteous and waypoints are frequent, going back to the city to sell and back to the waypoint to continue questing is not a problem.

There's another stress tonight from 7-11 pm EST.

Yeah I know. I'm debating whether to stay up or not (it starts at 1 a.m. my time).