A fair and brutally honest review, independent of how big a budget the MMO has.
Also one that has tested all of the explorable dungeons, WvWvW and class balance in PVP. That takes time. If you're reviewing the launch of an MMO you need to see all of the important parts of it.
Review scores for big budget MMOs are always inflated. 94 is of course too high for a game that doesn't have in game trading.
Hell, SWTOR, an awful MMO, got 9s and 10s on almost every site. A column writer was fired from this very site for giving it a 6.
Reviews are worthless.
What do u mean? In-game trading? It has a flawless mail system and a trading post.... How gives a crap about early MMO sickness that will get flushed out in a couple of weeks.
94% is a good score if compared to every other MMO out there. It should have the highest score among MMO's released since the DAOC/Everquest days.
I agree that reviews are worthless though, it's one random dude/dudett's opinion. Things like metacritic etc and the total score on MMORPG.com's user ratings is a better indicator of a games awesomness.
You should be able to trade between players. It's dumb that that basic feature isn't there.
Review scores for big budget MMOs are always inflated. 94 is of course too high for a game that doesn't have in game trading.
GW2 has in-game trading.. it just doesn't have character to character trading. There's a difference, and GW2's system is better since it still gets to you immediately and your mail is accessible from anywhere. I'd give it higher points for this.
No it's not better. What if only one person sends the item for the trade? Character to Character trading is also far more convenient if you are together.
complaining about an early review isn't the same as complaining about teh actual score.
I'd agree with frodo on this, even if mail system was working 100% of the time, you can't really sell anything besides on the AH, which was also up and down. So you either kept it rotting in your inventory or you spam map chat trying to sell it, then you gotta play the trust game. You either give them the item first or you get your money first.. but sadly with no way to force the person to pay for taking the item, you could easily get screwed. In trading there is no worries.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
That part is very true indeed. The weeks before GW2 came out I was going to Skyrim for the pve, FF3(android) for my story based pve, LoL for my pvp and really had no big scale pvp to go to(PS2 Im looking at you!). In GW2 I have different options that fit into different contexts so I never feel "burned out".
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Character to Character trading is also far more convenient if you are together.
Totally agree . I duo with the Mrs and when you get a drop the other can use .. having to mail the other when you are stood next to each other isn't the best .. Would be nice if they added a character to character trade system
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
That part is probably why some people don't like GW2 and others can't get enough...
2 new camps.. generalists vs focused.
To the OP - reviews are garbage.... all you can do with a game is play it.
I lost respect for PC Gamer after they gave DA2 such a high rating. That said, I predicted that GW2 would have a 93% metascore, and so far, I'm doing pretty well .
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Maybe some day Guild Wars 2 will reach the same level of variety of content. It's RvR needs a lot of work.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
I remember DAoC also... dungeons crawls were silly and no one did them (loot was subpar to crafted by a fair margin) in fact the ONLY reason people did raids pre ToA was for glowy effects.. the best gear was always crafted.
People used to level at particular camps at certain level ranges.... hardly anyone wandered around or explored... how do I know? Every camp had a flipping line of people waiting to get into the xp group.
It was very grindy except for levels where you were able to do battleground pvp.
DAoC's plus side was the pvp... everything else was meh. ToA blew HARD because while you used to be able to pvp on any character soon as you hit 50 by just a week or two of grinding... now you had to do ToA skill crap and needed the artifact gear.
Ruined the game.
EQ1 was 100x as grindy though and I miss the dungeon crawls.
How can you score it already? That's patently ridiculous. And if you score it now you have to deduct for HUGE queues on many servers for WvWvW and the TP being down so long.
I don't understand the rush to review MMOs.
Gamers want reviews immediately. So the site that has the earliest reviews gets a lot of traffic and therefore profits.
If gamers were a more patient crowd they would wait for a company who did a dedicated one month game cycle to give a full dedicated review, but that takes too long compared to an "I played over the weekend" review.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Maybe some day Guild Wars 2 will reach the same level of variety of content. It's RvR needs a lot of work.
Really? Do you even play DAoC or GW2? As someone who's played both games I'm seriously wondering.
DAoC had little content outside of pvp and GW2 has smaller, but more complex battlegrounds/rvr.
And I liked DAoC... it just had nothing going for it beyond pvp.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
I remember DAoC also... dungeons crawls were silly and no one did them actually, they were the primary way to level up, especially pre level 40 (loot was subpar to crafted by a fair margin) most new players couldn't afford crrafted gear in fact the ONLY reason people did raids pre ToA was for glowy effects.. the best gear was always crafted. They did it for fun and for respec stones and vanity items. Its by far the best raiding system I've ever seen in an MMO.
People used to level at particular camps at certain level ranges.... hardly anyone wandered around or explored... how do I know? Every camp had a flipping line of people waiting to get into the xp group. I never waited in line for a camp in my 8 years playing the game, I think you're confusing it with EQ. There were always comparable areas to go, and you got bonus exp for killing mobs nobody has touched in a long time.
It was very grindy except for levels where you were able to do battleground pvp. Which was from levels 15 to level 41...
DAoC's plus side was the pvp... everything else was meh. It had some of the best PvE content out there. It's just the PvP was better. ToA blew HARD because while you used to be able to pvp on any character soon as you hit 50 by just a week or two of grinding... now you had to do ToA skill crap and needed the artifact gear. ToA's impact on RvR was bad and indeed killed the game. But the content itself is the best raids I've seen in any MMO to date. Better than EQ, better than Vanguard, better than FF11.
Ruined the game.
EQ1 was 100x as grindy though and I miss the dungeon crawls.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Maybe some day Guild Wars 2 will reach the same level of variety of content. It's RvR needs a lot of work.
Really? Do you even play DAoC or GW2? As someone who's played both games I'm seriously wondering.
DAoC had little content outside of pvp and GW2 has smaller, but more complex battlegrounds/rvr.
And I liked DAoC... it just had nothing going for it beyond pvp.
I'm guessing YOU didn't play DAoC. It had a ton of amazing PvE content. Just because you focused on PvP doesn't mean it wasn't there.
And GW2's RvR doesn't match DAoC's yet. It's fairly incomplete. Good start though.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Maybe some day Guild Wars 2 will reach the same level of variety of content. It's RvR needs a lot of work.
Really? Do you even play DAoC or GW2? As someone who's played both games I'm seriously wondering.
DAoC had little content outside of pvp and GW2 has smaller, but more complex battlegrounds/rvr.
And I liked DAoC... it just had nothing going for it beyond pvp.
Yeah I agree about DAoC. Don't get me wrong, like you I really loved that game and it did have great classes and RvR...but PvE-wise, EQ was better hands down.
WoW's score was spot on. The game was epic when it came out and this was reflected by all the praise the game got. But then again back then critic scores actually meant something.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
"ArenaNet seem to have wilfully ignored the fact that gamers have, over the last decade, segregated themselves into camps: PvPers and PvEers, hardcore and casual. GW2 wants you to be a generalist. Overcommit to a single part and the experience suffers: you’ll either burn out on chasing down vistas, grow weary of competing over the same four PvP maps, or lag behind the levelling curve of your personal story. The experience suffers when the pace falters, but it’s a solvable problem. You can always do something else."
It is so very true. It describes GW2 perfectly.
Thats how all MMOs were designed before WoW.
Funny, the WOW fans spend all their time talking about how bad pre WoW MMOs were, and now that an MMO comes along that embraces the ideas of pre WoW MMOs, its the JEsus MMO.
I remember those mmos differently. Gring, camp grind, some more grind and a little bit more camping.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Maybe some day Guild Wars 2 will reach the same level of variety of content. It's RvR needs a lot of work.
Really? Do you even play DAoC or GW2? As someone who's played both games I'm seriously wondering.
DAoC had little content outside of pvp and GW2 has smaller, but more complex battlegrounds/rvr.
And I liked DAoC... it just had nothing going for it beyond pvp.
Yeah I agree about DAoC. Don't get me wrong, like you I really loved that game and it did have great classes and RvR...but PvE-wise, EQ was better hands down.
EQ had better classes and better dungeon design, but it did not have a better variety of things to do, nor did it have better raids, for the simple fact that raids in EQ are elitist and tier based, like WoW, whereas raids in DAoC allowed anyone to join in, and were done for fun. And variety of things to do is what this discussion is about. DAoC beats EQ for variety and similarity to GW2.
i personally think the score is a tad high. with all the teething prblems i would score it late 80's but as somebody points out in the comments, pc.gamer did give DA2 94%
None of the PC Gamers testers was banned for nothing i belive , few hundreds players got banned with no reason and they cant even contact support as all ArenaNet system is not working properly.
Just my 2 cents to 94% score - 49 % is more accurate here
How can you score it already? That's patently ridiculous. And if you score it now you have to deduct for HUGE queues on many servers for WvWvW and the TP being down so long.
I don't understand the rush to review MMOs.
Hey at least it's not as bad as EuroGamer Italy who reviewed it on day of release and gave it 100%
You should be able to trade between players. It's dumb that that basic feature isn't there.
mail system does the same thing, whats teh problem? I am always sending things to guildies and itis a lot more convenientr to mail them than chase them down and do a face to face trade
Comments
Also one that has tested all of the explorable dungeons, WvWvW and class balance in PVP. That takes time. If you're reviewing the launch of an MMO you need to see all of the important parts of it.
You should be able to trade between players. It's dumb that that basic feature isn't there.
I'd agree with frodo on this, even if mail system was working 100% of the time, you can't really sell anything besides on the AH, which was also up and down. So you either kept it rotting in your inventory or you spam map chat trying to sell it, then you gotta play the trust game. You either give them the item first or you get your money first.. but sadly with no way to force the person to pay for taking the item, you could easily get screwed. In trading there is no worries.
That part is very true indeed. The weeks before GW2 came out I was going to Skyrim for the pve, FF3(android) for my story based pve, LoL for my pvp and really had no big scale pvp to go to(PS2 Im looking at you!). In GW2 I have different options that fit into different contexts so I never feel "burned out".
I'm not saying this in an attacking maner btw, but, keep dreaming.
Oh good, another kid who pretends he played EverQuest and then pretends all pre WoW MMOs were EverQuest. Pro tip- they weren't.
I remember DAoC. Hm, today should I ... find a gruop for a dungeon crawl? Go explore? Do bounties? Talk to some NPCs and find quests? Do kill tasks? Hunt for an artifact? Go on a raid? Go in the battlegrounds to level up? Go into the frontier to level up? Take the central keep and fight the other realm for bounty and realm points? Steal the relic from the enemy? Take a tower? Sail around in a ship? Do I solo? Do I craft? Should I work on a spellcraft template? Should I just go to the bar and hang out with guildies?
Who needs reviews when nowadays you can watch 100's of beta videos on youtube.
Totally agree . I duo with the Mrs and when you get a drop the other can use .. having to mail the other when you are stood next to each other isn't the best .. Would be nice if they added a character to character trade system
That part is probably why some people don't like GW2 and others can't get enough...
2 new camps.. generalists vs focused.
To the OP - reviews are garbage.... all you can do with a game is play it.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Maybe some day Guild Wars 2 will reach the same level of variety of content. It's RvR needs a lot of work.
I remember DAoC also... dungeons crawls were silly and no one did them (loot was subpar to crafted by a fair margin) in fact the ONLY reason people did raids pre ToA was for glowy effects.. the best gear was always crafted.
People used to level at particular camps at certain level ranges.... hardly anyone wandered around or explored... how do I know? Every camp had a flipping line of people waiting to get into the xp group.
It was very grindy except for levels where you were able to do battleground pvp.
DAoC's plus side was the pvp... everything else was meh. ToA blew HARD because while you used to be able to pvp on any character soon as you hit 50 by just a week or two of grinding... now you had to do ToA skill crap and needed the artifact gear.
Ruined the game.
EQ1 was 100x as grindy though and I miss the dungeon crawls.
Gamers want reviews immediately. So the site that has the earliest reviews gets a lot of traffic and therefore profits.
If gamers were a more patient crowd they would wait for a company who did a dedicated one month game cycle to give a full dedicated review, but that takes too long compared to an "I played over the weekend" review.
Really? Do you even play DAoC or GW2? As someone who's played both games I'm seriously wondering.
DAoC had little content outside of pvp and GW2 has smaller, but more complex battlegrounds/rvr.
And I liked DAoC... it just had nothing going for it beyond pvp.
I'm guessing YOU didn't play DAoC. It had a ton of amazing PvE content. Just because you focused on PvP doesn't mean it wasn't there.
And GW2's RvR doesn't match DAoC's yet. It's fairly incomplete. Good start though.
Yeah I agree about DAoC. Don't get me wrong, like you I really loved that game and it did have great classes and RvR...but PvE-wise, EQ was better hands down.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
EQ had better classes and better dungeon design, but it did not have a better variety of things to do, nor did it have better raids, for the simple fact that raids in EQ are elitist and tier based, like WoW, whereas raids in DAoC allowed anyone to join in, and were done for fun. And variety of things to do is what this discussion is about. DAoC beats EQ for variety and similarity to GW2.
None of the PC Gamers testers was banned for nothing i belive , few hundreds players got banned with no reason and they cant even contact support as all ArenaNet system is not working properly.
Just my 2 cents to 94% score - 49 % is more accurate here
Hey at least it's not as bad as EuroGamer Italy who reviewed it on day of release and gave it 100%
mail system does the same thing, whats teh problem? I am always sending things to guildies and itis a lot more convenientr to mail them than chase them down and do a face to face trade
I miss DAoC