Headstart impressions

netman

I can't shake the feeling that this game is unfinished and unpolished in spite of what EA/Mystic/GOA might claim.

My impressions of the headstart after playing for about an hour:

- Massive queues and ridiculous wait times
- Unstable client and you're back in the long queue after game crash
- Unintuitive interface
- Poor graphics

The graphics part is the easiest to look past, I'd play a game with a C64 look&feel if it was fun.

But I can't get past the shoddy interface, maybe it gets better over time but my god, after playing WoW (and I can't help but compare) this game came out years after, and is years behind in every sense.

I ended up being in a PQ, didn't even know that I was, then this chest appears on my screen and the game tells me I got some loot and that I should click on the chest. Of course after a while it becomes apparent that the chest on my screen is not the chest that I should be clicking on, so off I go on the search to find the damn chest. As I'm walking around I notice something on the minimap that kinda looks like it might be the chest, but there's no chest there. I probably did that PQ 4-5 times before I found the chest.

Chat is pretty much non-existent, all I see is a bunch of toons walking around like zombies, I might as well be playing alliance battlegrounds on WoW.

Their web site is absolutely terrible and further strengthens the impression of an unfinished product. Not to mention that there doesn't seem to be any support on offer.

Fun factor? Um, as close to zero as it can be at the moment.

I'm thinking of cancelling my play.com preorder before it ships.
Is WAR worth giving it a second chance? I mean I seriously have to ask, what's to like about it?

Dcully

Totally disagree.
GFX are rather good for an mmo on a decent rig imo.
If they made better gfx a huge amount of players will moan that their pc cant run it,look at when aoc was released.
Queues are nothing to do with the game,its a server size issue and im sure will be addressed soon,theres queues in all mmos at times.
Unstable client?
I havent had a single crash in OB or early start,its very stable for me.
There is nothing wrong with the ui,just as good as wow one if not better,the search party in your area is excellent,the way you can customize it to your liking is also something wow doesnt have.

Did you ever think that you can dislike a game without having to feel you need to say this and that is wrong with it?
Im loving it as are anybody ive spiken to ingame.
Apart from goa screwup at start of OB the early release version of the game is the best release of an mmo ive experienced.

humanji

I have to agree with some of your points. I'm thinking of giving it a miss for a week or two until they sort out the queues. It's just ridiculous to have to wait an hour or so to get into a game. I've purposefully created characters on low population servers just to have something to do, with no intention of really advancing the character.

The client is a bit hit and miss. To be honest, I think this is one of the most stable launches of any MMO I've played. It's crashed a few times, but to be honest I kind of expected it to do that. As the game has just launched the headstarts, they're still finding their feet. It'd be ridiculous to expect a perfect launch these days as all developers are under pressure from publishers to release on time. The game is definitely finished, it just needs some tweaking.

Not sure what you mean about the interface though. It's fairly identical to WoW, as most MMORPGS's are. It's failry customizable too and to be honest it gives you a hell of a lot of informaiton at a glance. Once you get used to it, it all becomes second nature and you get thankful it's there.

Graphics are grand, I think. I'm not sure, but I heard something about the graphics being updated just after the full launch. Can anyone say if this is just a rumour or not? As you say, the graphics don't matter as long as the gameplay is fun, but it'd be nice to have them better, with more options for tweeking them (options seem a little sparse at the moment).

You're problem with the PQ chest brings up a point that really bothered me when I first started. There's no tutorial. You get the odd help message that points out what things on your hud do or give you info on an action you've just done, but I found they didn't really explain what I was doing or why. God knows how I'm going to figure out crafting.

Chat is fairly empty at times, but it depends on the people around you, and if you group up with others you kind find a lot of fun people playing. Plus, once the guilds get set up, I'm sure Ventrillo or Teamspeak will be used, which will make things a lot easier.

And which website are you talking about? The wow-europe.com site is a travesty. Just don't use it. There's better ones out there with more information.

Can't really understand how you're not having fun at the moment. The single player content is identical to WoW, but is easier to get into and doesn't leave you popping onto websites to find out what the hell you're meant to do. The main fun of Wow was the end game content and the high level PvP, which you can pretty much do from level 1 in War (although you generally get you're a$$ whooped. Or maybe that's just me ). Plus there's a lot more PvP and RvR content at later levels.

As for cancelling it, well if you're not having any fun with it now, then you're wasting your time. I still can't understand how you're not enjoying it, tbh. If you can't see it as an improvement from WoW then play WoW. No point playing something you don't like.

Rev Hellfire

Can't say I've had any issues to date with the game, certainly no crashes.

As for the issue with queues, well pretty much all new mmorpg's have had them at the start. They'll settle down in a week or so I'd expect if past history is anything to go by.

Certainly the graphics aren't as good as lotro or aoc, having a cartoony feel about them. But that'll keep the hardware requirements down and help in high load areas. They're certainly not bad, just not cutting edge.

Must say I'm enjoying the pve much more than I did in both lotro and to a lesser degree AoC. The former I find quite a chore, sorry blister , I'll get there I promise...

The little PvP I've done hasn't been as good as the moors in view, but I'm hoping that's because I'm still in noob territory and it'll get better once I leave there.

Maximilian

netman wrote: »

I can't shake the feeling that this game is unfinished and unpolished in spite of what EA/Mystic/GOA might claim.

My impressions of the headstart after playing for about an hour:

- Massive queues and ridiculous wait times
- Unstable client and you're back in the long queue after game crash
- Unintuitive interface
- Poor graphics

The graphics part is the easiest to look past, I'd play a game with a C64 look&feel if it was fun.

But I can't get past the shoddy interface, maybe it gets better over time but my god, after playing WoW (and I can't help but compare) this game came out years after, and is years behind in every sense.

I ended up being in a PQ, didn't even know that I was, then this chest appears on my screen and the game tells me I got some loot and that I should click on the chest. Of course after a while it becomes apparent that the chest on my screen is not the chest that I should be clicking on, so off I go on the search to find the damn chest. As I'm walking around I notice something on the minimap that kinda looks like it might be the chest, but there's no chest there. I probably did that PQ 4-5 times before I found the chest.

Chat is pretty much non-existent, all I see is a bunch of toons walking around like zombies, I might as well be playing alliance battlegrounds on WoW.

Their web site is absolutely terrible and further strengthens the impression of an unfinished product. Not to mention that there doesn't seem to be any support on offer.

Fun factor? Um, as close to zero as it can be at the moment.

I'm thinking of cancelling my play.com preorder before it ships.
Is WAR worth giving it a second chance? I mean I seriously have to ask, what's to like about it?

I think your impression of the game has been soured a bit due the technical difficulties you said you were having elsewhere.

1. the queues will improve over the coming days & weeks
2. client has been exceptionally stable for me. Not one crash.
3. Graphics aren't great sure but they are ok and I can live with that. Art design is great however & that's more important.
4. I think the interface is great plus easily customizable.
5. Chat is non-existent because people are to busy playing the game and joining groups is a cinch.
6. Official website is rubbish, yes.

Triangle

Hmm imo

1) Lower graphics means you chan have more characters on screen at one time and still not take a hit gfx wise. the problem (as i see it) with high graphics is that you walk into a RvR sceen with 100+ peeps in in and you'll crash (or wish you had)
2) Server queues - i've read they have temporarily reduced the number of players on each server - but even if they havn't. The more people on a server the more peep to kill
3) Quiet chat - wait till people level up further and have time to chat - most are busy leveling atm
4) no Desktop crashes for me yet!! (fingers crossed)


This is by far the most stable release of any MMO i've played (thinks back to SWG or EvE and the rollbacks!!)

The PvE element of a MMO is only a fraction of what a MMO is about. You'll probably spend most of your time in an MMO playing RvR or PvP. And my hopes are that this RvR will rival that of DaoC (which is the undisputed champion of end games i.e. RvR/PvP)

BKtje

I've had some stability issues, all of which are actually as i log out. It just hangs on me after the countdown ends. Bit of a strange one really.

Apart from the queues i'm actually really enjoying this game. Kind of like i did when i first played wow many many moons ago.

jaggeh

Something you have to realise is the reason for an early cap on populations (resulting in q times) is to spread out the pop to all servers prior to general release.
This will give a broad selection to newcomers and when the caps are pushed back it will give late comers a chance to join friends.

As for stability, i think thats more of a local issue you need to look at, as the consensus here is that the game is doing well.

Posting from mobile ftw

ThE_IVIAcIVIAIV

B-K-DzR wrote: »

I've had some stability issues, all of which are actually as i log out. It just hangs on me after the countdown ends. Bit of a strange one really.

Apart from the queues i'm actually really enjoying this game. Kind of like i did when i first played wow many many moons ago.

same as me with the logging out. maybe our slow comps?

b0bsquish

I have the same problem trying to exit, I end up just killing the task, the queues are a pain, but not alot that can be done about it yet, it makes sense that they have to do it.
Gameplay so far has been excellent, RvR has been great so far (Quite a queue for it)

The PQ seems quite buggy, even walking past a pq last nite (Mob attacked me, I ran away, and I ended up 4th?!)
The chat just really doesnt exist everyone seems quite content running around ignoring each other Even in any groups Ive came across, quite strange.

zekiel

The only real issue I've run into is if I minimize it, the client opens back up but its just black so I have to kill the client and restart, which is a pain with the current queue's.. other than that I think this is going off a storm and Im gonna say its a possible wow killer but lets wait and see how the high level content fairs out to find out if its has that lastability element.

humanji

Actually, I was wondering if this was just me, or if it happens to anyone else where on the server selection screen it doesn't say how many characters you have on a server?

Cuddlesworth

b0bsquish wrote: »

The PQ seems quite buggy, even walking past a pq last nite (Mob attacked me, I ran away, and I ended up 4th?!)

My understanding of the PQ quests seems to be whatever you scored(dps, healing etc) plus a random bonus alotment. Hence if you keep doing it odds are you will have to come first eventually.

Rev Hellfire

Noob question, but what's the chest thing that pops up on your screen and the counter beside it for. Hell where's the chest your prize is in even ?

humanji

When you do a PQ, a little chest appears on the screen (which is a little annoying). If you click on it, you will see how you did compared to everyone else who played the PQ. If you're in the top of the bunch, you win a prize. A chest appears in the game near the center of the quest and you click on it and recieve a loot bag. You can then right click on the bag a select a prize.

You get influence for each npc you kill in a PQ and for anythign collected in it. And there's also a bonus for completing it (I think). This influence gives you a bonus that may give you a better chance at getting a higher rank. Also, if you don't win and do the quest again straight away, you get another bonus to help increase you chances of winning something.

And then when you fill your influence bar for the quest level, you run back to the rally point guy (you know, the guy who you talk to to set where you teleport back to) and you can select up to three prizes, one for each level of influence you achieved.


My main gripe with the chest is the fact that it stays there for ages, even if you don't win anything.

whatduck

zekiel wrote: »

The only real issue I've run into is if I minimize it, the client opens back up but its just black so I have to kill the client and restart, which is a pain with the current queue's.. other than that I think this is going off a storm and Im gonna say its a possible wow killer but lets wait and see how the high level content fairs out to find out if its has that lastability element.

Switch to windowed mode, fixed the problem for me and many others, no more black screen.

humanji wrote: »

Actually, I was wondering if this was just me, or if it happens to anyone else where on the server selection screen it doesn't say how many characters you have on a server?

Not just you, same for me aswell and I'm guessing everyone. Another thing which annoys me is that you need to click on both licence agreements every time you log in, anyone else get that?

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

My understanding of the PQ quests seems to be whatever you scored(dps, healing etc) plus a random bonus alotment. Hence if you keep doing it odds are you will have to come first eventually.

Your right but I think its a bit bugged at the moment I've had PQ's where i accidentally killed a few mobs and later had a pop up saying I did not contribute enough to roll and than PQ's where I kill one mob run off and than get to roll.

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

Noob question, but what's the chest thing that pops up on your screen and the counter beside it for. Hell where's the chest your prize is in even ?

Thats the scoreboard for PQ's the actual loot chest is usually beside the body of the PQ boss.

humanji

whatduck wrote: »

Another thing which annoys me is that you need to click on both licence agreements every time you log in, anyone else get that?

Gah! That's another thing I forgot to complain about. For the love of f*ck, I agreed the first time, I'm not going to change my mind!!! And it's not like you can simply click agree. You have to scroll down to the bottom of the message, check the box and then click agree. And then do it again!!! :mad:

zekiel

whatduck wrote: »

Switch to windowed mode, fixed the problem for me and many others, no more black screen.



Not just you, same for me aswell and I'm guessing everyone. Another thing which annoys me is that you need to click on both licence agreements every time you log in, anyone else get that?



Your right but I think its a bit bugged at the moment I've had PQ's where i accidentally killed a few mobs and later had a pop up saying I did not contribute enough to roll and than PQ's where I kill one mob run off and than get to roll.



Thats the scoreboard for PQ's the actual loot chest is usually beside the body of the PQ boss.

window mode reduces performance and its not something I like doing. But its a way to get around it for the moment.

Have to agree about the license part... pain in the arse having to do it every time.

Maximilian

humanji wrote: »

My main gripe with the chest is the fact that it stays there for ages, even if you don't win anything.

I have no gripe about this at all. I got killed at the very end of a PQ last night, having come first. I was very reassured to see I didn't lose out as I raced back to the chest before the timer ran out.

humanji wrote: »

Gah! That's another thing I forgot to complain about. For the love of f*ck, I agreed the first time, I'm not going to change my mind!!! And it's not like you can simply click agree. You have to scroll down to the bottom of the message, check the box and then click agree. And then do it again!!! :mad:

Yeah its annoying. That is supposed to happen every time the game is patched. Maybe they have been applying lots of small patches but I'd say it is some kind of bug. It didn't happen with the Beta. Just the once and then again after the last patch.

humanji

Maximilian wrote: »

I have no gripe about this at all. I got killed at the very end of a PQ last night, having come first. I was very reassured to see I didn't lose out as I raced back to the chest before the timer ran out.

Well I don't like it because I hardly ever win anything and it's a reminder that I'm a failure.

Maximilian

I don't understand how you don't win? You may have to play it 3 times but you will eventually win the loot. Replaying isn't a waste either as you get renown points for them also.

I usually win one of the top prizes within two plays of a PQ, once on the third. It's not that I'm a better player that's for sure. You will just never win on the first round, as those who missed out last time get a bonus, which can be as much as 300 or 500 to their roll, that's in addition to any contribution bonus they got (which is not as much as the persistence bonus)

humanji

Ah I don't lose outright (well not after playing the thing 3 or more times ). I usually don't bother with what you ge tin the chest anyway. The equipment you get for the influence is much better. I did actually get first once and as soon as it announced I had won, it crashed on me. A little piece of me died that day...

Maximilian

Yeah, the renown reward seem pretty good alright.

Kiith

I'm loving it so far. There are some issues (if i get one more +200 roll in a PQ after coming 2nd i swear to Jebus i'm gonna kill someone), but its as much fun as i ever had in Warcraft.

PQ's are great expept for the rolling. Its nice to have such easily accessable group quests. The RvR is fantastic. I love that they will bring your rank up to a certain level if everyone else in the scenario is way higher then you. Brought my Chosen into an RvR at level 2, and was brought up to rank 8. Got to renown rank 4 in one RvR, which was nice. I cant wait to get some guild runs going.

Speaking of the Guild, whats the deal? How much is it to create one? Or do we already have one created?

whatduck

A quote from the GOA community manager on the EULA and TOS clicking:

This is intentional for legal reasons. Each time you play WAR, you're actively using a service and must therefore agree to the terms of that service. Adhering to the EULA and COC is not a once-off flare; it is a continuous commitment. So why not make the procedure of accepting these terms more user-friendly, such as having the 'agree' box checked by default? One answer to this is that the less effort required to agree to something, the less is its juridical weight.

Whereas being annoyed about this feature is understandable, it may be useful to put things into perspective. It takes me some two seconds to scroll down, check the box and press the button. Repeating this for both the EULA and COC is a five second procedure. Repeating this a couple of times a day and even crashing a few times still only adds up to half a minute of your day. A small price for hours and hours of glorious WAR I'd say.


-Magnus

Complete bs. I can understand after a content patch or if the conditions change but every time ya log in is just really annoying, especially considering ya have to scroll down, tick the box and than press accept for both of them. They'd wanna change this or they're just alienating their customers.

KoKane

Dont forget, the best may be yet to come (punkbuster)

jaggeh

Kiith wrote: »

Speaking of the Guild, whats the deal? How much is it to create one? Or do we already have one created?

we need 6 people in a party in the same place at a guild quartermaster in order to form a guild.

think we had 2 people last night

death1234567

whatduck wrote: »

Complete bs. I can understand after a content patch or if the conditions change but every time ya log in is just really annoying.

Agreed, just have boxes ticked by default, who cares about the Judicial Weight??

Maximilian

whatduck wrote: »

A quote from the GOA community manager on the EULA and TOS clicking:



Complete bs. I can understand after a content patch or if the conditions change but every time ya log in is just really annoying, especially considering ya have to scroll down, tick the box and than press accept for both of them. They'd wanna change this or they're just alienating their customers.

That's total balls. The idea that it carries more weight by making you scroll down is crap. You still don't read the damn thing. There is no difference between clicking a mouse to accept and scrolling + clicking.

Some lawyers are idiots (and this could only be a lawyer's idea)

whatduck

Yes well apart from a moronic GOA and their policies I'm really loving the game so far, ain't been getting much lag lately. Love the WH and the Empire vs. Chaos zones. Between RvR, questing and PQ's the game has a great feel to it.

Baneblade

i did find the graphics slightly worse then wow, hoping its just to do with the beta client.

had a quick go on a dwarf as i did not have time to queue and i thought the part where you use the cannon was great fun. I like the small different things like that

Big Knox

Baneblade wrote: »

i did find the graphics slightly worse then wow, hoping its just to do with the beta client.

had a quick go on a dwarf as i did not have time to queue and i thought the part where you use the cannon was great fun. I like the small different things like that

I play with everything on max settings and I can tell you the graphics lose WoW's. There not even close.

Jim

Personally I think the interface is awesome, much better than wow's.

Re server queues; There are pop caps on the server atm which are being increased daily. The queue also has to to do with the population inbalance. If there's loads of Destruction on but few Order, then prepare to wait in queue as a Destruction. Its to keep the rvr fair.

Dcully

i did find the graphics slightly worse then wow, hoping its just to do with the beta client.

had a quick go on a dwarf as i did not have time to queue and i thought the part where you use the cannon was great fun. I like the small different things like that

The graphics in WAR are light years ahead of those in wow.

Max settings @ 1650X1050 4Xfsaa,16xAF its an mmo of beauty.

netman

Two days into it, I managed to do one RvR scenario. Waiting times are huge even though the scenario doesn't run for that long. Admittedly I didn't have much of a clue what was going on, just tried to keep the people healed and capture the flags when I could. Turns out I was one of the top players there, so go figure. Naturally we lost

Today.. log in, patch, queue, go make some food, eat, grab a beer, queue almost done, check email, surf the web, queue done, log in, sign up for a rvr scenario, do a PQ, wait for PQ restart and surf the web.. go back into the client - the screen's black! I can move the mouse cursor and hear the sounds but I can't see anything.. wonderful.. kill the task, restart, another patch to be downloaded, log in, 2h queue!

That's pretty ****ty. This is a game for people with nerves of steel, endless time and nothing better to do with it. I'm off to do other things and I'll leave an auto-clicker running so it doesnt log me out after 2 hours.

I feel an uninstall coming soon

humanji

Its not really the games fault it wasn't designed for your computer, is it?

whatduck

This is a MMO they always have issues with release, client has bugs, servers have bugs, game has bugs, as releases go this is one of the smoothest.

If you can't handle how MMO's play just after release just wait a few months. Heck Europe didn't even get their own servers for WoW till 4 months after the US.

EDIT: Windowed mode gets rid of the black screen, use it as a temporary solution till they fix it.

Baneblade

i take back my comment about the graphics, changed the res and it looks alot nicer

Jim

Yea, windowed mode kills the black screen issue. Also if you're running full screen and it happens just alt tab a few more times and that usually fixes it.

R0ot

The lag!!!! ..... :mad:

Baneblade

anyone done a scenario yet, was in a queue for it all last night and nothing

netman

I managed to get into a RvR scenario on the first day and never again. I usually queue up when I log in, and it never opens. Probably broken.

humanji

I've been in a few. LAst night I was queing for a fair bit and was in the middle of a PQ when it said I could enter the scenario. I ended up not doing the scenario so that I could finish the PQ (and then ended up coming last out of 26 )

Spear

netman wrote: »

I managed to get into a RvR scenario on the first day and never again. I usually queue up when I log in, and it never opens. Probably broken.

There seems to have been a glitch introduced yesterday which has broken the scenario queues.

Dcully

I managed to get into a RvR scenario on the first day and never again. I usually queue up when I log in, and it never opens. Probably broken.

I spent 2 hours last night in scenarios.
One ended and almost instantly i joined another.
Infact i played that many scenarios i levelled from lvl 9 - lvl 11 purely by taking the repeatable scenario quest and handing it in each time before joining again.
I normally hate pvp in mmos but man rvr is so much fun in WAR.
Got a nice helm drop for my sorceress in there too lastnight

jaggeh

yeah loot from pvp has tyo be one of the best parts of the game.

Tusky

netman wrote: »

I feel an uninstall coming soon

Youve made lots of posts like this. I havent experience any of the issues that you have. Its obvious a problem on your computers side of things.

netman

Tusky wrote: »

Youve made lots of posts like this. I havent experience any of the issues that you have. Its obvious a problem on your computers side of things.

I've made two comments about the instability of the client. That's not really lots, is it?

The first issue of the game crashing didn't happen after updating to the latest, unsigned, drivers. The second problem is plaguing everyone, there's plenty of evidence of it here and on other forums.

I just happen to alt-tab a lot, I like to use my computer for other things when I'm queueing for 2 hours, and there are plenty of times when I'm completely lost in the game and need to look something up etc. And it is extremely frustrating when you switch back to the game and find a black screen with just the mouse cursor and sound working, and no way to get back into it but to kill the client and restart it. Which of course puts you right at the back of the queue.

So far that's my biggest gripe with the game. I'm still trying it out but I'm far from being impressed by it like the most people here.

Maximilian

Regarding the alt-tab thing, I get that too - I have found alt-enter works so far, mind you only a few times. Maybe give that a go

Tyrant^

Maximilian wrote: »

Regarding the alt-tab thing, I get that too - I have found alt-enter works so far, mind you only a few times. Maybe give that a go

I can alt tab fine. Textures look a REALLY bad for about 30 seconds then it sorts itself out.

Kiith

Tyrant^ wrote: »

I can alt tab fine. Textures look a REALLY bad for about 30 seconds then it sorts itself out.

Thats the same thing that happens to me. In fairness, we cant really complain about this being a problem with the game. You aren't really supposed to alt-tab while in game, as it screws with the textures and whatnot. It can be annoying not to be able to do it, but its really not that essential. Just do the full screen window if you really want to do it.