Vanguard out sooner than expected?

Venom

http://www.vanguardsoh.com/pressrelease_20061013.php

While Im looking forard to this game this sudden change in release date smells of SOE's usual policy of releasing unfinished games reguardless of the bugs in them.

Gizzard

God I hope not, Im in the BETA its one of the dullest games I have ever played due largely to the dull classes, broken combat and 3 frame animations, GFX are real nice in places though, but actual world design is AWFUL, needs at least another year

Venom

Been playing the last few days in beta5 and I'm so not impressed with this game. To me it feels like EQ1 with EQ2 and WoW bits with very little new bought to the table and this game will not put a dent in the WoW server numbers.

The one thing that does impress me is the size of the world, its DAMM HUGE and I mean HUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGE. But the map is really bad and nothing more than a basic outline at best. This over site makes finding npcs such a pain in the ass it make me quit out of the game at times which is something iv never done before in any mmorpg. Sadly it suffers from bland and dull landscapes the same as SWG did but the cities really do look good. The music is also the best Iv heard in any mmorpg.

Sadly everything else is not up to scratch.

The Character creation while having lots of options to make long arms or skinny legs or longer necks, has very few option face wise so every orc/elf/dwarf looks the exact same. The hair gfx looks really bad and the animal races really look awful. The gfx engine is also very un-optimised so expect to either play it on very low settings or invest in a uber pc and play the game on medium settings. VG is roughy the same as EQ2 graphics wise but hardware that will run EQ2 with all the bells and whistles will chug along on VG.

One positive thing to note in VGs favour is how many sets of armor there are that are unique as Iv been through 4 completly different sets so far and my character is only level 14. While every race seems to share the same armor looks/types not having every war/rouge and caster loooking exacty the same is a huge benifet imho.

Quests are pretty much the usual with fetch x amount of y or deliver parcel from npc A to npc B. There are some cool scripted events on some of the quests but over all most players will have seen and done em before. Also for a game thats claimed to be hardcore it used the same system of giant icons over the heads of NPCs that offer quests as WoW and EQ2. The low amount of quests took me by surprise after coming from a game like EQ2 which had almost every NPC offering you a quest or series of quests as in VG quests and the NPCs who offer them are few and far between.

Combat is pretty much the same button mashing as other mmorpgs. There are some special moves for want of a better word you can pull off as certain combat arts cause effects on the target and other combat arts that do extra damage when a certain effect is up so you tend to string out combos like a beat em up. EQ2 had a similar idea but VG does it much better.

The interface is not great and just dosent work for me as everything is tucked away such as your inventory and stats info and it makes it a real pain to look them up. The way the interface handles any dialog when dealing with NPCs is just ****ing dreadful and I felt it went out of its way to break any immersion between you and your character.

Bugs are rampant to a scary degree considering this game goes live in a week and there seems to be a serious lack of content for certain cities. The biggest impression I got from VG was this was just another level grinding treadmill lacking in the charm or wow factor that WOW and EQ2 have.

I was looking forward to VG for a long time, even the ultra rapid HARDCORE fanboys didnt put me off that much until the day I heard SOE had gotten involved in the mix. SOE have been releasing buggy and unfinished games since they got into the business and VG is no exception. This game needs another 2-3 months at least due to bugs, woeful graphic engine performance, lack of content for lower levels, dull landscapes and a serious lack of quests. My prediction is a month or two of serious bug fixes and additions to the core of the game and then word will start to leak out of the devs working on the next expansion.

BlackWizard

Nice sky thought right?

I'm patiently waiting Age of Conan. I was thinking of playing this game as a filler until AoC comes out but after hearing so many bad things and just "meh" comments about it, I doubt ill be wasting my money.

humanji

I'm confused. How old is this game? I was looking for forums and the "official" one has little info on them, which I guess is to be expected if it's a new game. But I looked around the net and found forums that go back to 2004. What gives? Am I confusing this with some other game (although the forum does say Vanguard: SAga Of Heroes)?

Spunge

Anyone want to donate their buddy key to me?

humanji

Spunge wrote:

Anyone want to donate their buddy key to me?

Will do when I get home


I'm actually really enjoying this game. Much better than WoW in my opinion. The fact that it pretty much forces you to get to know people and team up, make it a fairly sociable affair. And I like the fact that the diplomacy and crafting aren't just tacked on things to take your mind off wandering. Although they can get frustrating at the start when you're trying to figure out how they work, they're fun and have good missions attahed.

And what I like most is that mounts don't cost hundreds of thousands of gold to buy (you even get some free near the start!).

Ivan

zomg, its out already?

wtb friend key!

Spunge

humanji wrote:

Will do when I get home
I'm actually really enjoying this game. Much better than WoW in my opinion. The fact that it pretty much forces you to get to know people and team up, make it a fairly sociable affair. And I like the fact that the diplomacy and crafting aren't just tacked on things to take your mind off wandering. Although they can get frustrating at the start when you're trying to figure out how they work, they're fun and have good missions attahed.

And what I like most is that mounts don't cost hundreds of thousands of gold to buy (you even get some free near the start!)

Awsome

I lost my passion for mmos a few months ago and it was annoying coz when you're really into an mmo there is nothing better. A lot of people are saying this game reinvigorated their love of the genre. I hope that happens for me, fingers crossed.

Also is it possible to solo at all? If so, what would be the best class? I was soloing as a shaman in wow and that was a lot of fun.
What i really liked about WoW was i could solo doing quests do crafting or harvesting and then when i wanted to group id just LFG to do an instance and it seemed like a perfect balance.

humanji

It is possible to play solo (I have been for the most part, but I'm still fairly low level). If you're going to go the ass-whooping way through the game, you're going to need a team. Go 30 seconds out side of a town and you're going to get the head beaten off you, but you can get by, almost.

As for class, I don't really know. There's 19 races, each with their advantages and classes that they can be, so I basically picked at random. Also, be mindful of the fact that each race starts in completely different areas. For example, there are three human races, one is medievel, one is oriental and the other I think is arabic, and their settings reflect this (I'm in the oriental area and it's pretty damn cool).
But as I said, I'm only starting and there's so much to learn in this, even the things I thought I understand have levels beyond what I already know (so prepare for headaches ).

Well, anyway, I pm'd you the buddy code.

BlackWizard

I bought the the pre-release of this. Shame I can't get a refund. :mad:

Venum summed up my toughts.

Spunge

BlackWizard wrote:

I bought the the pre-release of this. Shame I can't get a refund. :mad:

Venum summed up my toughts.

That sucks man

Venom

BlackWizard wrote:

I bought the the pre-release of this. Shame I can't get a refund. :mad:

Venum summed up my toughts.

I know what you mean bro. I was so looking forward to this game, even the die hard fanboi's who wanted it to be ultra hard didnt put me off but the moment SOE got involved I knew it would suck ass.

As far as Im concerned its nothing but a bad WoW rip off with EQ2 style graphics.

humanji

Ah, that's a bit harsh. It's not a bit like WoW at all. They're two completely different styles of game.

Venom

humanji wrote:

Ah, that's a bit harsh. It's not a bit like WoW at all. They're two completely different styles of game.

Its exactly like WoW only with the hardness level pushed way up and with a EQ2 graphic style.

Combat abilites are used and upgraded just like WoW with getting so many skills and then getting a rank 2/3/4/5 as you level up.

Quests are exactly the same as WoW in how the way they are given from NPC's and the way you can see the other quests the NPC has in a dialogue box that exactly the same as WoW's.

The interface is not exactly like WoW's interface. IT IS WoW's interface.

Spunge

Poor old wow

humanji

Which is exactly like EQ2 which is pretty similar to EQ which, if you thiink about it is really like MUDs. They all come from the same thing.

WoW is a user friendly pick up and play game. It doesn't really have a lot of depth to it, but it's great fun and as such has a huge fan base.

Vanguard is specifically keeping away from the Wow type gameplay to try and make the game more involving. Wow is a hack and slash (well, push button and wait for something to happen, and slash), but the creators of Vanguard made it more than just that. They want people to create communities and to not simply head off on their own ignoring everything that's around them in order to get to the lvl cap. The fact that you don't even have to go off killing random monsters in endless quests, makes it a hell of a lot different. You've whole avenues to explore in different fields and it's unlikely to leave anyone bored.

BlackWizard

I wouldn't blame SOE on the game being so bad. But I would blame them on
releasing a product that isn't finished.

I think what really threw me from the game at the start, was how horrible it was
to control my character. Im used to smooth transitions across the surface like in
normal games such as Half Life and City of Heroes. But VG seemed to be a big
flat board with cells on it that you had to talk into. Jumping is horrific looking.
Any object that is near you visually will more than likely get your character
stuck. The buildings and props are all kinda like cardboard boxes and what you
think you can talk into or onto you cannot.

The second thing was one of my first quests. Took me 45min to do. I had to
beat up some of the guards to make sure they were not slacking or something.
So I went around beating up lots of guards for ages until I realised what I had
to do was to walk around from the person that gave me a quest and talk to
the guard that was standing still not moving. It looked like a bug at first, but
thats really how he is meant to be. A stick figure standing still near the guy
that gave me the quest.

After that it just continued. There is no one to tell you how to travel across
zones. How the leveling system works. What happens when you die in PvE and
in PvP. What bind stones do and portals and corpses.

You are thrown into this flat world with a few hills,trees and the odd character
that tells you to kill X amount of this and Y amount of that.

Positives are that it is VERY open. So you have to talk to others a lot and to
try and team as much as you can. But then again your mates or guild mates
will probably have a level difference to you so you wont ever see them again..

After years of this type of game being played and developed they have not
achieved anything new. Even the graphics are pretty meh. I can play on
full detail too! The sky isn't even as nice as I thought. I don't recall even
seeing a nice sunset...

humanji

Think we're playing different games I only had one major problem so far and that was down to me (forgot I was defraging the computer at the same time. D'Oh!). But other than that I've not had a bother. Graphics are up full and, to me, look great. Granted they're not up there with Doom3 and the like, but it's a trade off I guess, for many users and larger areas.

I think what is the main reason why I like this is that I only actually heard of it a week or so before I got it. I hadn't noticed it at all before then, so I had no expectations of it. So once I started her up (the second time) I loved it. I also don't see the large empty areas that everyone seems to go on about. Maybe it's the starting areas that I'm at, but they're full of life, things to see and loads of misc quests knocking about.

But as is said, it really isn't finished yet. Although I've had no problems, many people have, and I've had the odd anomoly of "Null Void" come up at the start of conversations (but then again, that could be some sort of Matrix style plot that they have waiting for me!). It's sad that publishers can get away with forcing games out, but it happens all the time. I guess the only good point to that is, because it's an online game, it'll be constantly updated. Every cloud...:D

KilbarrackBlows

i started this last week havent touched it since lagg to demanding on your pc you really need a super pc to play this but from what ive been messing on with it the past few days on and off the classes are dull basicly the game is dull not alot of people playing it.
game isnt out of beta which i didnt know so dont bother with it for a few months .

Playboy

I'm playing on Frengrot pvp server atm .. lvl6 monk. Char name is Taen. Look me up if anyone else is playing or send me a pm here

humanji

KilbarrackBlows wrote:

game isnt out of beta which i didnt know so dont bother with it for a few months .

Sadly, the game is in retail. But like almost all games these days, it's simply not finished with the whole "ah sure we can release a patch later" mentality.

Venom

humanji wrote:

Sadly, the game is in retail. But like almost all games these days, it's simply not finished with the whole "ah sure we can release a patch later" mentality.

I think its more a case of all SOE's games that are pushed out before there ready. I dont recall WoW being in such a bad state when it came out. Apart from the insane demand for game boxes and them having to toss up loads of extra server to cover the demand which no one was expecting, but neither of these are the ingame issues weve been talking about here.

humanji

Well SOE have never really had a great history for delivering what they promise, but it is becoming a trend for a lot of publishers to force developers to ship before they're ready. I blame the internet! Without it, they'd be forced to actually finish the games (although playing Wow or Vanguard by mail would prove awkward).