Out with the new, In with the old.

Well, since I haven't put up a blog post in lord knows how long, here's an update of what I've been up to gaming wise.

Over the last couple of months, I have been playing the Mortal Online open beta with a friend of mine. And until the news of it's impending release, we kind of had a crappy time.
Let's face it, the game just sucks.
It's holly incomplete, boring, and buggy as hell with zero content.
We both felt it was time to wash our hands with it and move onto something more interesting.


As such, he convinced me to try out Final Fantasy 11, which he used to play a while back and enjoyed it quite a lot. I never got into it because it didn't come across a solo friendly, and I'm not a fan of level centric games by any stretch of the imagination.
However, over the last couple of days, the FF11 trial has been really fun.
Sure the game is dated, but it's seasoned as well. There is just a hell of a lot of things to do.

There is quite a lot of grinding involved, but I'm not minding it that much. Mostly because I'm playing with someone else, and partly because they've made the game a great deal easier, and soloable.

So by the end of the trial, I may very well shell out for this game.
It starts with a 15$ purchase, that includes all the expansions, plus 30 days game time.
Pretty damn good deal I think.
And to make things sweeter, the subscription is cheaper than usual.
Only 12.50$ per month rather than the 15$. Hell, I'll take it.


But so far, there really hasn't been anything too objectionable about the gameplay.
It's just fun...... grindy yes, but fun non-the-least.

So if it continues to go well, I think I'll update my blog a bit more often with news of my adventures in FF11...... at least until Final Fantasy 14 comes out.



~Yoh

MO Open Beta

Well, yesterday Mortal Online's open beta started.... sort of.
Like damn near everything in MO, the patcher doesn't work most of the time.

After watching the forums, no end of problems have ensued from patchers breaking, desinc and lag, to the server crashing over night. (the devs were asleep at the time, so I'll cut them some slack)

Not a good start.


As for myself, I have even been able to get pass the broken launcher, due to the ever popular, yet seemingly impossible revision error, said the dev Sebastion Perrsson.

You'd think they could at least make a functioning patcher, but no, apparently even that is beyond their grasp.


I can't help but feel that Starvault is doomed in the long run if they struggle with even the most basic of things, but maybe it's harder then I think.
But in saying that, I've played many more low budget games, and few of them have these kinds of problems.


Nothing will suck modivation from you quicker then a crap patcher.


~Yoh

MO let down

Well, I participated in the 2nd stress test for Mortal Online yesterday, which was extended for another 6-8 hours due to popular demand, which was cool of them.

While it wasn't for the purposes of beta testing, I had a good enough go of it to get a general sense.

It was bad..... really, really bad. It warrants my blog's name in full.
Just down right painful, from beginning to end.... almost.


Combat was effectively non-existent.
Everything was sluggish and unresponsive, and you just couldn't hit anything.
Seriously, they have this weird, backward ass hitbox system, that just doesn't work half the time.
You end up aiming over your intended target, waiting about 5 seconds before you find out weather anything happened or not.

Easily the most incomplete, arduously painful combat I have ever seen in a game.
Even as far a beta goes.


Even the most basic of tasks was a drawn out affair in frustration.
To mine or gather wood, you had to go through about 3 different windows to find the right skill to use, put it on you skill bar that won't sit still, draw your starter axe, then continue to activate the relevant skill every 2 seconds.

Oh, and after all the, at least in the beginning, you only get 1 piece of word/ore about 50% of the time. Here's the kicker, you need about 500 just to make starter weapons.
Yeah, fuck that for a joke.


Inventory management is also downright painful.
The drop system is weird, requiring you to press about 3 or 4 different keys just to open your loot bag.
And when you gain items, you'd think they'd auto-stack right? Nope, duplicated of the same stuff has to be manually stacked. And due to the lag involved in this, it becomes irritating very quickly.


And don't get me started about the text based taming..... fuck me was that painful.
Thought it was a quaint idea at first, but practice proved it to be otherwise.

I can go on and on about just how freaken bad it is, but it's time I leverage it with some high points.



First, the world is vast and pretty nice to look at. Vacant, but nice.
The only real enjoyment I got out of it was jumping down a 90ft tall waterfall. That was cool.

Second, there we're quite a lot of play made structures, and that gives it a nice feel, and shows that it has something in the long term to work for.

Lastly, while I never got to experience mounts, due to the fucking taming system, they appear to be great fun, as well as being one of the few nearly complete systems in the game.
(minus the fact there is only one type of mount as it stands)



So overall, I'm grossly disappointed.
It sounds so good on paper, but in practice it just doesn't go anywhere.
There are so few good things to say about it, and I'm trying to be generous.

While it is still beta, as many fucktards continue to point out, this is beside the fact that is was a inch away from releasing a month ago. And it has made virtually no progress since.
Unless they fix the parts of the game that matter, combat being chief among them, then MO will likely die right out of the gate.
It's almost unplayable.

Too bad to, it has so much potential.


~Yoh

Mortal Online

Well, just today Mortal Online had it's NDA lift.
And the flood gates have opened.

I've just spent the better part of 3 hours going over information about the game, watching videos, etc.
And I must say, it looks quite good.


With the NDA lift, they also stated on their website, that they are not far off the open beta.
And for once, I may actually do an open beta. Downloading the torrent as I type.

So within a couple of weeks, I'll be able to put her through her paces, and see how she handles.


So far I have been given the distinct impression that it would be like Oblivion online.
But that's good, because I really do like Oblivion.

Maybe not all the time, but it's good to play once in awhile.



Though I doubt it will hold me in the long run, it will it least have me for awhile should it live up to expectations.
(thou, I never really intend on any game keeping me for the long run)

But we shall see.

~Yoh

More MMO's and some scandals

Nothing too exciting, but after reading a post of Massively about a MMO I've never heard of before, Mortal Online, then going on to read and interview, I must say I'm rather impressed.

The developers of this game not only seem to be blatantly honest, knowing full well they are a niche game, but the seem to have taken all the right lessons from EVE Online.
No levels and no classes, a good start.
They seem to be going down a FPS sort of system, and I got the impression it was going to be Oblivion Online. Which is not a bad thing, Oblivion is a good game, it's just not for everyone.

It's a PvP centric game, so right off the bat it's not really my cup of tea. But all in all, they seem to be moving in an interesting and solid direction. Nothing that hasn't been done before, but good all the same.

So I think I'll be checking this one out.



Other then that, it seems EVE has had yet another scandal.
Some CSM member basically broke the NDA he signed, by attempting use knowledge of future changes in order to make a lot of isk.
But he was caught of course, rather quickly too, and was banned temporally and kicked off the CSM.

Nothing too out of the ordinary for EVE, but interesting all the same. I felt CCP dealt with this quickly and professionally, and the offending CSM member seems to have learned their lesson.
So I think it was rather well handled.

Yet another reason I want to work for CCP - Integrity


~Yoh