Is Fun too much to ask for?

Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games aren't new. In fact as a genre they're now officially old (7 years to be exact), and what's bugging me right now is that new games are coming out that just do not improve upon the very basic element that should be present in any game:

FUN

Where did this come from? Well I picked up Everquest II this week, after playing in the Beta. Now playing in a Beta is great because you can usually figure out if you're going to like the game before having to buy it. Why didn't it work this time for me? I don't know, I'm going to have to chalk it up to a near habitual need to pick up the latest game. That and I need something to distract me from the other FUN MMORPG coming out in 2 weeks time whose Beta I'm also in but I want to not continue because it's so much fun I don't want to spoil the real game by getting too far in the Beta.

Everquest II

Now, to start on the plus side the game is beautiful. Everything I've seen so far from the dark and dangerous city of Freeport to the pristine surroundings of Qeynos makes me want to see more. If I had to describe the art style it would be Realistic, as realistic as a fantasy game can be anyway. Next I will say that the introduction to the game is also great, definitely a game that greet newcomers and guides them along the basics of game play. The Class system as far as I got was interesting, inviting, and rich with associated content. Lastly the Audio is amazing, Voice acting does make a difference and it made for a very immersive experience at first.

Unfortunately these can not at this point compensate for some weaknesses that frankly I might not even have noticed were it not for the aforementioned FUN game.

Firstly there's the waiting: waiting for health to regenerate, waiting for a group so you can do the encounter that would be impossible to solo, waiting for just the right item to drop so you can finish a quest. I'm spending money and more importantly time, and I shouldn't have to wait for some predetermined amount of time before I can keep playing.

Secondly there's the vague quests: Apparently Everquest is all about either running around endlessly exploring, or hoping someone else has already done it and pestering them until they tell you where to go. Most of the Quests in the game have vague instructions like "You must go Visit Bob in greater Mukluktuk Forest" , which is great until you realize you have no idea where that is and if it wasn't for others having already found it or online sites you could run around for hours without finding it. Even better you could find it only to discover you need to be 4 levels higher not to die instantly at the hands of some beasts guarding the spot.

Next there's Death: Death is always a touchy subject, and admittedly the first few times I died I was relatively close to a safe spot, so retrieving my Spirit Shard (a ghostly afterimage) didn't seem so bad. That was until I eventually died far far away from anywhere and I just didn’t want to go get my shard, and every time I entered this game area a glowing trail would link me to this distant spot. I just wanted it to go away. Oh, but you can't. You can leave up to 10 of these faux corpses across the landscape and if you don't go get them, they stay there for 3 days. If you're really unlucky you died somewhere that you'll die again at if you even go near.

And there's more, but even ranting about it isn't fun, I'd much rather talk about the fun game coming out soon.

Now I'm not some Warcraft fanboy, I don't even particularly like Warcraft and I was never a big Real Time Strategy Game. Frankly when a friend mentioned it I dismissed it out of hand, until I got into the Beta and was forced to admit the error of my ways.

World of Warcraft

As I keep emphasizing, what struck me most after playing a few different characters was that the guiding principle of this game was so easy to discern: Make it Fun. WoW is like the iPod of MMORPGs, it's that thing you didn't know you could have because everyone else was doing it the same bad way for years.

To start, the art style is very unique and while many elements in the environment are not as detailed as say Everquest, overall the effect is very pleasing. It’s very cartoonish in the best sense of the word. Orc lands are bright red deserts almost to the point of being Martian, and the Undead lands are dark but not in the you can’t see where you’re going sense of the word, more like a Tim Burton movie.

The way your character is brought into the world and coached through the initial stages of the game is both immersive and entertaining. Even better it’s different depending on which of the 8 races you play. As well you are never left in doubt who or where you are meant to go. Through a system of Exclamation Points and Question Marks above some non-player characters heads you can easily track your progress.

Quests are also much easier to understand, without giving everything away. This is done just by the inclusion of directions: “Go to the Mine North and East of here and slay some spiders”. What’s actually amazing is if you even remotely follow those directions you’ll end up in the right place. This is because the Geography of the game is such that it is always easy to guess where you should be headed, and there are maps generated for each area you’re in as you explore them. In 20 hours plus of play for one character I only once had one of those “moments”, waiting for the bad guy I needed to reappear so I could finish.

They’ve also broken out of the standard mold by giving all classes ranged weapons of some sort, from Wands to Guns. This totally changes the dynamics of the game, when a Mage runs out of Power he can whip out his wand and still participate, while re-energizing at the same time. That and the fact that the recharge time for Health is much faster than other games out there, help to keep you playing. It’s like the developers actually want everyone to be actually doing something all the time.

What shocked me was how much I wanted to keep playing, it was like when Ultima Online first came out, or Diablo. Now I know what all the hype has been about from those guys at the online gaming sites who rave about it. An MMORPG that so far doesn’t feel like work, it feels like a game.

Amazing.

And I mean iPod, iTunes, Google Amazing.

Posted at 11:08 PM to Personal By: John Fairley