LoTRO Impressions

The day has come and the clandestine cover of the Lord of The Rings Online beta test NDA has been lifted. I am at last free to offer my impressions of this highly acclaimed title from Turbine, considered to be one of the top potential MMO releases of 2007.

I enjoyed this game. I spent about 3 weeks playing through early beta and I have returned after wipes to test out features and see what progress Turbine has made during the latter implementation phases, and I can say that while I am unlikely to play post-launch, I think this game has promise. Turbine certainly has a great deal of content to back fill to flesh out the game and tighten up the polish, but LoTRO has some very creative mechanics and entertaining game play.

But First The Bad:

Immersion into the battle for Middle Earth is difficult. Turbine actually did a very good job incorporating elements of the Rings trilogy into the MMO lore, but also suffered quite a bit from the bulk of such an extensive and comprehensive licences. The trek from Bree to Rivendale is short and uneventful and the landscape lacks any significant 'high adventure.' Were this generic MMO, it would be commonplace but the user expects to be accosted by Orc, and pursued by Ring Wraiths and an MMO setting just can't simulate the journey of the Nine like a film can. Besides who gets to be Gandalf?

Magic is far too prevalent. Gandalf lit fires the old fashioned way for a reason. He had limited magic and only in rare events did he use it. Healing was done by a very special few. In LoTRO in order to accomplish the traditional MMO role archetypes, Turbine introduced alternate interpretations of magic and healing. Health and Mana are not there, but the two colored bars that represent it are. A rose by any other name... Bards 'heal' characters by playing tunes and lifting their spirits, but in the end, Bards are the priests and paladins of Middle Earth and Lore Masters are the wizards.

Static Mobs. In my first few hours I recall wandering out into the noob zones, hunting wolves. The wolves barely moved from their spawn spot, and graphically they were quite limited. This underwent significant improvements during the later content upgrades, but it never reached a level indicative of a top tier MMO.

Wow That Sounds Like Crap... I Thought You Liked This Game:

I do. I said it has potential and I meant it. Game dynamics are excellent and the game is quite fun to play. There is a feat style character development system that I really enjoyed. They are not game breaking advancement, but you get cool titles and small stat bonuses as you acquire these Accomplishments. At one point I killed a bunch of brigands on the roads and received a title Cyndre "Watcher of Roads" and another for exploring so many different elven ruins. I wish more MMO titles added these types of 'flavor' elements to their games.

Combat is very well thought out and designed. I consider it to be one of the best examples of organic combat on the market, rivaling Warcraft in terms of smooth animations and polished actions and animations. For a while my Bard lacked any real actions but these were added around the time that instruments were added to the class.

Class use is creative, and despite my dislike of the prevalence of magic, I don't see how they could have gotten away without a healing archetype and a ranged caster archetype. If they had to implement them, they did so well and with very deft mechanics. I played a Bard for the better part of my time in Middle Earth and I enjoyed it. They were able to implement the class with minimal use of twisting a la EQ Bard.

All in all, I wish Turbine the best in this endeavor. I think their release will be quite successful given their delay in following the release of Vanguard and Burning Crusade and quite a few subscriptions will go their way. If they continue to update the content and polish at the pace that I witnessed in Beta, they will have a very solid title 1 year, 2 years 5 years from now.

I am Vanguarded

A few days ago, I warned of an impending rant about an as of yet, unreleased MMO that has been much acclaimed during it's development. Now would be the time to click your browser back button if you would like to avoid, said rant.

Vanguard: Saga of Heroes has been on my proverbial MMO Watch List sense Brad McQuaid left SOE and announced he would be developing a third generation MMO with his production company, Sigil Games. For my regulars here at Existential Worlds, you know that I have a bit of a World of Warcraft addiction at the present time, but that was originally meant to be a temporary fix, while Vanguard was developed.

For me, Vanguard was to be the culmination of a long string of frustrating MMO experiences. From Neverwinter Nights on AOL, to Everquest, I had wandered the existential worlds of the MMO game space, only half satisfied with my role in them. They lacked that feeling... Tobold dubs it the Crushbone Factor, which is certainly applicable, despite the fact that it refers to EQ.

So I watched and I waiting, and finally the day arrived... my email inbox brought me tidings of my involvement in Vanguard's Beta development phase.

My first impressions were very mixed. The world was stunning in some respects and completely disappointing in others. The engine was a behemoth and I could hardly have visual setting above the bottom tier 'Highest Performance' in order to move my avatar at all. I thought to myself, this is Beta... this is why I am here. Customization, optimization, bug correction and game play evaluation... these are my quests...

After weeks of frustration, I had to walk away. It was early Beta, but I felt as though the game had been pushed to Beta too soon. I was struggling to stay involved and never once felt immersed. I felt as though I should not have been there yet, it was too raw, too empty to even test appropriately. Too 'broken' if you will, or perhaps too 'unstarted' even. So I left.

Three weeks ago, I reinstalled my client and decided to give Beta another try. Beta 4 had been announced and I felt that perhaps the progress I had been looking for would be in place and the game would be ready for testers. I logged in and found myself gaping at the same landscapes devoid of npc life, the same bugs, the game graphical failures and the same uninspired implementation of truly inspiring innovations...

I set about leveling my Cleric and once again, I felt deep disappointment at the absolute waste of wonderful innovations. They had burdened the title with a bulky and unwieldy engine, game play is choppy and modeling and animations are uninspired. Questing is bland and unoriginal. Progression is chaotic and poorly thought out, and the client continues to struggle under the press of their system requirements. I run a powerful machine and I still can't play at even the 'balanced' graphics tier without tremendous lag.

A few days later Sigil and Sony announced the January 30th release date for Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, and I uninstalled my beta client and walked away from the game forever. They promised a third generation MMO and produced a half finished 1.5th generation MMO in the vein of Everquest with a few bells and whistles as differentiation. They Beta'd too early and failed to address the concerns of their testers in any cognizant fashion. The progressed the Beta too fast, and placed too little emphasis on content development, instead focusing on expansive lands and a diverse feature set. They innovated conceptually and programmed poorly. They gave me high hopes, and dashed them with forceful abandon.

So now I am Vanguarded against new titles. I refuse to be spun by fancy press releases and doctored screen shots showing the absolute best a game can do. Anyone can crank up their graphics settings, snap a fancy photo and post it on the interweb... but do they have what it takes to make a truly inspired world? A world alive that simply makes you scream... I WANT TO LIVE HERE! Sigil failed in that regard. Brad's 'vision' and Brad's reality did not align properly, and SOE and Sigil are going to release a very unfinished game into a market dominated by a very polished Warcraft and a slew of great titles that are getting better with each passing content patch.

Farewell, Vanguard... The dream of you was sweet, but now I must move on.

Game Testing and NDAs

I try to stay fairly plugged into industry news and communities, and thus I run across a myriad of opinions about game testing from the denizens of the dank rocks under which I hide. One of my pet peeves is the prevalent attitude that game testing, specifically public or private alpha and beta phases, are for the benefit of the test participant rather than for the company or the game title.

Here are some things that game testing is NOT:

• Reward: Game testing is NOT an entitlement program for your good citizenship, your connections in the industry or your 1337 skilz at pwnz0r teh nubs in X game!
• Free Gaming: Game testing is NOT an opportunity for you to try out a new game before you have to pay for it. It is NOT there for your entertainment, gratis.
• Skill Development: Game testing is NOT an opportunity to hone your skills at the next big MMO title, so that you can get a jump on everyone else or join the uber guild.

Here are some things that game testing IS:

• Stress Testing: Game testing IS an opportunity for developers to see how their game features and servers perform under 'normal' conditions.
• Bug Discovery: Game testing IS an opportunity for developers to find and correct game bugs, unintended mechanics, and close loopholes and exploits.
• Focus Group: Game testing IS an opportunity for game developers to get a pulse on what the player think about the game and the various features of said game.

So what impact does game testing have on the success of a given title? The answer varies, but with the right testers and the proper action from the development team, game testing can be the difference between a disastrous flop of the highest magnitude, and a well polished game shipped when it is ready.

When you join any phase of game testing you agree to certain rules that prohibit the sharing of information, outside of the private forums and sanctioned events. These Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) are critical for the integrity of the testing phase, for a number of reasons. An example of this, is World of Warcraft vs. the current beta leaks coming out of Vanguard: Saga of Heros. During my time in the World of Warcraft testing, my initial impressions were terrible. Game play was choppy, bugs were prevalent, content was disastrously minimal and the servers were unstable as all hell. However, after months of restarts, rollbacks, patches, feedback and fixes, World of Warcraft shipped as one of the most polished MMOs in industry history. Sure there were bad news leaks out of the WOW alpha and betas, but they were minimal and did little to quell the hype surrounding the game, and the result is history.

On to Vanguard... Everywhere I turn, non-public information about the current state of the game is available. Videos, screens, commentary and frankly, very little of it has been positive. Is Vanguard a bad game then? I would wager money that it is not a bad game at all, however the people who violate the NDA are painting that picture with very vocal brushes. This is unfair to the company, the title, the fans eager for this game, and the industry as a whole. When you join a testing phase, you are agreeing to represent that company and until said NDA is lifted, it is imperative that the information and opinions that you develop during your time there are secret.

So what do I do when I am invited to test a game?

• I log in, and play hard.
• I try to break the game, exploit every way I can think of, use every feature and push the limits of the world that the development team has created.
• I take detailed notes. This servers two purposes, as I can both formulate my opinions for public discourse after the NDA is lifted and I can make informative posts for the development team.
• I report my findings often. Find a bug? Repeat it and record the facts. Write a synopsis and submit it with detailed concise information and a clear header [BUG] Moss Snake Kicks.
• I respect the NDA. I may think this game sucks and will flop, but it is not my place to push it over the precipice. There will be plenty of time for that after the NDA is lifted.

I hope everyone who is invited to join in the game testing process, can make a similar set of mantras for themselves, and help the industry grow and develop.