Life in Alganon

xyltan

I've posted this in another forum, meant to post it here, so I've cut and past it in:

I've just recenlty begun playing Alganon. I was in the beta for some time, thinking like most that this game was well beyond launch and that it wasn't ready. But, I will say how wrong I was in that assesment of the game. Not only is it ready, but the first 24 hours of playing Alganon was amazing, the game release was very smooth and as polished as one can be for any MMO.

I know most who have played Alganon imediatly compare it to WoW. The interface is very similar, the command keys are virtually the same and the game plays like WoW. Unlike WoW though, after playing this game for several hours and now days, I started to notice the differences, though subtle were becoming more and more evident. The most different aspect of the game isn't the graphics (which in my opinion are unique to Alganon, contrary to popular belief) nor the quest systems, nor the study system. But what stood out for me was the way the game made me feel. I felt like it was a throw back to the glory days of MuDs and the pioneers of MMO's such as Ultima Online and Everquest. And what made those games stand out wasn't the graphics or game play, which were and still arguably are still very good, but what made them great was the community. And that is what Alganon is for me a great community of amazing people. Best way to describe the community of Alganon would be comparing it to an large guild of amazing players.

If you are looking for a game that brings great MMO concepts to the table, and offers a fabulous community of players, than Alganon is for you.

 

Thanks for reading my post.

Igorcht

 Well, I've been lurking on these boards for a couple days now, and I feel that in the wake of the wave of morons who have registered just to shill this miserable excuse of a game, I can register to spew venom.

 

If you really think that this game's graphics aren't a crappy, subpar rip-off of WoW's, you need to get your vision checked. They have NO character of their own. The environments aren't awful, but there's nothing particularly striking about them, and the character models are hideous. The animations are laughable, and the sound effects actually hurt my ears.

 

In terms of gameplay, the game is EXACTLY like WoW, down to the talents- sorry, abilities, and combat and skills, only it's clunky and dull. Now, people call Warhammer Online and Vanguard and the like WoW clones. While they're clearly inspired by WoW, they're not actual clones. Alganon is actually a clone. It's like they copied and pasted the game, and then took a big steaming dump all over it, and called it new. Their "revolutionary" systems are far from that. The studies system is ripped straight from EVE. It's like having an extra, non-functioning ear grafted on to the center of your chest; stupid and pointless.

 

The Library is just a combination of EQplayers or WoW Armory combined with Thottbot and accessible in-game. A neat idea, but hardly revolutionary.

 

The family system serves no purpose as far as I can tell, other than to act as an extra chat channel and provide cosmetic gear. Again, fairly pointless.

 

The dual role system is probably the only really interesting feature, but it's nothing to write home about. In short, all the crap David Allen raves about is like engraving and bejeweling a lump of feces. The core of the game is bad.

 

It does have a good community, though, I can't argue with that. So basically, Alganon is for people who really want to play WoW, but hate the community, and are willing to sacrifice quality in terms of graphics, gameplay, content, and lore in order to get it.

treysmooth

Originally posted by xyltan


I've posted this in another forum, meant to post it here, so I've cut and past it in:
I've just recenlty begun playing Alganon. I was in the beta for some time, thinking like most that this game was well beyond launch and that it wasn't ready. But, I will say how wrong I was in that assesment of the game. Not only is it ready, but the first 24 hours of playing Alganon was amazing, the game release was very smooth and as polished as one can be for any MMO.
I know most who have played Alganon imediatly compare it to WoW. The interface is very similar, the command keys are virtually the same and the game plays like WoW. Unlike WoW though, after playing this game for several hours and now days, I started to notice the differences, though subtle were becoming more and more evident. The most different aspect of the game isn't the graphics (which in my opinion are unique to Alganon, contrary to popular belief) nor the quest systems, nor the study system. But what stood out for me was the way the game made me feel. I felt like it was a throw back to the glory days of MuDs and the pioneers of MMO's such as Ultima Online and Everquest. And what made those games stand out wasn't the graphics or game play, which were and still arguably are still very good, but what made them great was the community. And that is what Alganon is for me a great community of amazing people. Best way to describe the community of Alganon would be comparing it to an large guild of amazing players.
If you are looking for a game that brings great MMO concepts to the table, and offers a fabulous community of players, than Alganon is for you.
 
Thanks for reading my post.

 

And I see  a shill that just registered to try to debunk the truth about this pile of crap that is alganon, give it up everyone knows how bad it is.

Holgranth

Well I'm glad your having fun obviously we have very different tastes.

I for one think that the game is a blatent attempt to cash in on the WoW formulae. To the poster above the Libarary is borrowed from Lotro which has a similar system

To my the studies felt tacked on and out of place. The graphics were horrible which I could live with if the system requirments were not so high. Anything that pulls that much on my cpu better look good.

Igorcht

Originally posted by Holgranth


Well I'm glad your having fun obviously we have very different tastes.
I for one think that the game is a blatent attempt to cash in on the WoW formulae. To the poster above the Libarary is borrowed from Lotro which has a similar system
To my the studies felt tacked on and out of place. The graphics were horrible which I could live with if the system requirments were not so high. Anything that pulls that much on my cpu better look good.

Ah. I only played a free trial for LotRO, so I did not know that. Well, that's just one more thing Allen touts as original that's already been done. Not that such a system is a bad idea, but it makes Allen even more dishonest to claim it as something new and exciting.

TheHavok

Originally posted by xyltan


I've posted this in another forum, meant to post it here, so I've cut and past it in:
I've just recenlty begun playing Alganon. I was in the beta for some time, thinking like most that this game was well beyond launch and that it wasn't ready. But, I will say how wrong I was in that assesment of the game. Not only is it ready, but the first 24 hours of playing Alganon was amazing, the game release was very smooth and as polished as one can be for any MMO.
I know most who have played Alganon imediatly compare it to WoW. The interface is very similar, the command keys are virtually the same and the game plays like WoW. Unlike WoW though, after playing this game for several hours and now days, I started to notice the differences, though subtle were becoming more and more evident. The most different aspect of the game isn't the graphics (which in my opinion are unique to Alganon, contrary to popular belief) nor the quest systems, nor the study system. But what stood out for me was the way the game made me feel. I felt like it was a throw back to the glory days of MuDs and the pioneers of MMO's such as Ultima Online and Everquest. And what made those games stand out wasn't the graphics or game play, which were and still arguably are still very good, but what made them great was the community. And that is what Alganon is for me a great community of amazing people. Best way to describe the community of Alganon would be comparing it to an large guild of amazing players.
If you are looking for a game that brings great MMO concepts to the table, and offers a fabulous community of players, than Alganon is for you.
 
Thanks for reading my post.

When I see a title that says "Life in Alganon" I expect to see a post where the player talks about his day to day actions and events in the game.  All you managed to do is say the game is similar but different then WoW and the community is good. 

Unknown

I guess Life is short

PhelimReagh

To my fellow Alganon-pessimists, it is possible that some people do, in fact, enjoy the game. Enjoying and defending the game doesn't make anyone a "shill". It makes them a fan.

 

Even a blind squirrel is going to find a few nuts eventually.

 

To the OP, I'm glad you enjoy the game. Good luck to you and the folks at Alganon.

Sarajiel

Originally posted by Igorcht

Originally posted by Holgranth


Well I'm glad your having fun obviously we have very different tastes.
I for one think that the game is a blatent attempt to cash in on the WoW formulae. To the poster above the Libarary is borrowed from Lotro which has a similar system
To my the studies felt tacked on and out of place. The graphics were horrible which I could live with if the system requirments were not so high. Anything that pulls that much on my cpu better look good.

Ah. I only played a free trial for LotRO, so I did not know that. Well, that's just one more thing Allen touts as original that's already been done. Not that such a system is a bad idea, but it makes Allen even more dishonest to claim it as something new and exciting.

The Library itself is actually a "wowhead.com" rip-off.

 

bbbmmmlll

I can understand the comparison to a MUD. Twenty years ago I ran a MUD. We had 100 players online at peak, between 4,000 and 6,000 total players in our database and lots of amateurish areas design by people with no programming experience let alone ever worked on a game. Many the long night I spent helping these young 'wizards', as we called the developers, realize their dreams. I got to know many of them really well. Fun times and fairly impressive for something ran and built by volunteers. It's also still out there along with plenty of other MUDs and there aren't any monthly charges.  Plus you can make your own stuff and really contribute!

If having a handful of players in an amateurish designed game is your thing then good for you. Personally I find the community argument a weak one. With so few players the game feels dead, finding a group is impossible and you'll never have compelling PvP. If you look you can generally find a decent guild full of compatible people anywhere you go. Even on WoW, hated for it's community, I found a guild full of great people. Instead I think the issue is more about feeling special and having no competition. On Alganon it's easy to be special. The GMs will talk to you, the devs will reply to your posts and none of the guilds are going to reject you because your warrior tank insists on wearing cloth armor and fighting bare handed (it's a role playing thing I'm sure). You are generally accepted by everyone. This isn't bad, but to me the downsides and the lack of a quality game trump the "everyone knows your name" experience. It also feels a bit fake to me. If the game was more popular all of this would go away. You could argue that failure is what makes the game.

The biggest issue with such as small community is can it even survive. A MUD, by the way, runs just fine on a junky old desktop with a DSL connection and a volunteer support staff. My guess is that the MUDs will be around a lot longer then Alganon. Maybe the OP should check some of them out. The cost is a lot lower, there are fewer crashes and you probably won't fall through the ground. But the community is there and that appears to be what the Alganon crowd is looking for.

Holgranth

Originally posted by bbbmmmlll


I can understand the comparison to a MUD. Twenty years ago I ran a MUD. We had 100 players online at peak, between 4,000 and 6,000 total players in our database and lots of amateurish areas design by people with no programming experience let alone ever worked on a game. Many the long night I spent helping these young 'wizards', as we called the developers, realize their dreams. I got to know many of them really well. Fun times and fairly impressive for something ran and built by volunteers. It's also still out there along with plenty of other MUDs and there aren't any monthly charges.  Plus you can make your own stuff and really contribute!
If having a handful of players in an amateurish designed game is your thing then good for you. Personally I find the community argument a weak one. With so few players the game feels dead, finding a group is impossible and you'll never have compelling PvP. If you look you can generally find a decent guild full of compatible people anywhere you go. Even on WoW, hated for it's community, I found a guild full of great people. Instead I think the issue is more about feeling special and having no competition. On Alganon it's easy to be special. The GMs will talk to you, the devs will reply to your posts and none of the guilds are going to reject you because your warrior tank insists on wearing cloth armor and fighting bare handed (it's a role playing thing I'm sure). You are generally accepted by everyone. This isn't bad, but to me the downsides and the lack of a quality game trump the "everyone knows your name" experience. It also feels a bit fake to me. If the game was more popular all of this would go away. You could argue that failure is what makes the game.
The biggest issue with such as small community is can it even survive. A MUD, by the way, runs just fine on a junky old desktop with a DSL connection and a volunteer support staff. My guess is that the MUDs will be around a lot longer then Alganon. Maybe the OP should check some of them out. The cost is a lot lower, there are fewer crashes and you probably won't fall through the ground. But the community is there and that appears to be what the Alganon crowd is looking for.

 

QFT The Warcraft community gets a horrible rap but in all honesty for every trade spamming moron telling anal jokes there are 50 people quietly going about their business.

Unfortionatly a lot of people let the tiny minority of vocal idiots ruin the game for them, and a lot of others use it as an excuse to bash WoW.