Rift - addons not required

[Anery]

So, I got bored of WoW. Not suprising really, the world is nothing new, the gameplay certainly isn't and every time they patch I have to futz about with all the addons I use that make life in Warcrack a bit easier. Add to that I can no longer raid due to actually having a real job and I see no point in playing any more.

I'd tried a few of the MMONGS out there, LOTRO kept my interest for all of one day before it fucked me off and I got bored. Global agenda held me for a few evenings before the lagg bummed me out, Guild Wars was more succesful but now my HoM is full I have little to do there either. Then there was Rift, which I really did not want to buy and even more I really did not want to like it.
Quite how I bought it I have no idea, I walked into Game and the next thing you know I am walking out clutching a shiny new Rift box - the bit in the middle is a bit of a blur and I suspect it would be best to leave it as such.
Anyhoo, installed the game, patched up and entered the game.
As I said I didn't want to like the game, spells and swords are not my cup of tea - guns and aliens please! (or shotguns and zombies - TSW) but when I looked at the clock later on and realised I had been playing for 2 hours I knew it was going to be an uphil struggle.
As many people have pointed out in reviews and whatnot, the game is not exactly groundbreaking, the storyline isn't exactly unique and the mechanics are very familiar to anyone who has played any MMO in the past. What makes Rift so good is that everything it does it does well.
Take the class system, there are four classes to pick from but what you are doing is really chosing a subset from which to really build your own class. In WoW you would choose your class and then you would be confied to that class's talent trees, in Rift you are confined to that class but you get a choice about what talent trees you would like, for example: a rogue might decide he wants to be a ranger, so he takes the ranger talent tree, he decides that he also wants to be fairly proficient when mobs get close to him so he also takes the blademaster tree and finally he decides to help out his teammates by buffing people in groups so he takes the bard who can dish out enhancements to his teammates. Alternatively he might go a bit Emo and decide he is going to sneak around and stab people in the back - he chooses the appropriate talent trees to help him do that.
These talent trees are what specify your abilities too, each skill unlocked as you put more points into the relevant tree.
Not groundbreaking, but its a fucking good idea.
Take the merchant, there is a button that sells all your useless crap to him without you having to think about it - in WoW you have to download another fucking programme to do that.
The UI is entirely customisable, no need to download a new UI, just alter it in game yourself
ALL BADGERS HAVE ARSES!

Like people have said before, Rift isnt ground breaking, its very very familiar. But it's that fact that it does everything better and with more style that makes it stand apart, I think this is going to be my game to go to until GW:2 and TSW/SWTOR come out.


Blightweald Server
Names *needs updating*
Hounds/Upnorf/Dunwoody/Corbulo/Leathers = Anery
Tchanol = Joose
Torpig/Coreflood/Soncho = Dog Pants
Idyot/Dubb = Spoodie
Gilbberig = Roman
Clowt - Sheriff
Taintpole - Pete

[Stoat]

Oh, another fantasy rolep-Badgers arses, you say?

[Dog Pants]

I'm interested in how this will progress. I've heard good things about the game, but often in a new MMO release it takes a bit of time for it to settle down for the long term. AoC and WAR both started out well, but suffered from a lack of things to do at higher level.

[HereComesPete]

Even we as quite casual gamers quickly maxed out characters in both (well I did) and discovered a hideous lack of higher level quests and end-game content.

[friznit]

I really wanted Conaids to work, because the style and world was so different. Sadly by the time I'd got over WoW it was already dead. Ironically people are now saying things about Rift that was first said about WoW - it doesn't do anything new, but what it does do it does better than everyone else.

[Legoshoes]

If anyone wants a "Well spun hat" code, whatever that is, i got one the other day in TF2 and have little use for it.

[Joose]

I wouldn't say no.








I would say yes, in case that wasn't clear. In fact, I am saying yes. Yes! see?

[Legoshoes]

Done and done. Hats are the best sign of a good game.

[buzzmong]

Done and done. Hats are the best sign of a good game.

*takes note*
*adds to game ideas*

[Anery]

I love mechanical horses
[/media]

[Dog Pants]

Ooh, nice. Also, looks a lot prettier than Warcraft.

[Anery]

Go here : http://uk.riftgame.com/en/products/alli ... 52bweekend

enter this G3G7-JCNX-ZJZT-KPN2-2NNG

Funtiems!

also, did someone say HATZ?!

[spoodie]

Aw, I only just uninstalled the game, from beta. I didn't want to pay for it but I wouldn't mind some time for free. Can I be bothered to download again ... ?

[Dog Pants]

That's an awesome hat.

[Sheriff Fatman]

I had a crack at this over the weekend using Anery's code (cheers, Henry). First impressions were not that great. Despite knowing that it didn't really promise anything new I was still a little disappointed in how similar it was to many other fantasy MMO's. Still, a few hours wasn't a fair chance, and it was free, so I played on.

After you get out of the starter areas and get a few more skills to play with things improve. The character progression is good, unfortunately, the free weekend was capped at level 15, so I only had a chance to start tuning my characters, but re-speccing and changing skill trees is painless enough and there seems good scope for fiddling about.

The Rifts are much like the public quest things in WAR and work well, first person in automagically starts an open public group which players are free to join and leave as they choose. The world is pretty and, from looking at the map, very large.

Overall, it's clear that they have tried to get a game that gets all the basics right from the start with a view to fluffing it from there. They have succeeded in that. Although there are doubtless issues to be ironed out, I didn't have any problems at all. A good game with a lot of potential.

I'll probably end up buying it (£24-ish+free month) but I'll remain cautiously optimistic.

[Dog Pants]

I've been playing this in bits when I've had time this week after Anery bought it for me for my birthday (cheers mate!). I can add my voice to those saying it's very Warcrafty, but nicely polished. In fact, it seems like they've listened to the people (like me) who've wondered why nobody ever just took all the good bits from the many failed, and occasional successful, MMONGs. That's pretty much what they've done - public quests like WAR (but better, you can slowly solo them if need be), rejiggability like Guild Wars, polished structure andf interface like Warcraft. In fact it can be a little too much like Warcraft, which is my only real gripe so far. I've got two characters at the moment - a big purple warrior with a pink afro, and a black chick Necromancer. As it turns out the warrior ended up being remarkably similar to a Warcraft Shaman (and ironically very similar in character and name to Soncho, my WoW character), and the Necromancer turned out to be pretty similar to my Warcraft Warlock. However, I'm already starting to see divergence and even if I do decide they're a bit too similar I can just go and respec, or but another class slot and make an alternative, switchable build. It's apparently pretty easy and cheap. So my little gripe is hopefully countered by the ease of experimentation in classes, and the bones of the game seem solid enough to support my interest at this stage.

What prompted me to post this now instead of later once I've had a good run at the game is this from PCG. Apparently the world event they were doing (similar to the CoH Rikti Invasions) was a huge failure. This is interesting to me for a few reasons. Firstly, the fact that they want to do regular world events at all is a good thing. If you're going to pay a subscription fee for a MMONG these days in the face of so many free-to-play games (and indeed the future juggernaught of GW2) then you need something like this to show the players what they're paying for. Secondly, the fact that it failed so spectacularly could be a good thing, if they learn from the mistakes and resolve to do it better next time. I can see huge potential in it just from what was suggested in the PCG article, and it's perfectly feasible. Having to fight hard just to keep the world free from invasion before you can even consider questing could potentially add a sense of immediacy that Warcraft has never had. Course it could also just piss you off because you can never get anything done. Lastly, the fact that they have the ability to release a world event mere months after launch, and then put resources into trying to fix it on the fly, shows that they've got the game in a pretty good state for release - most other new MMOs are still bug fixing and balancing at this stage.

So kudos to Trion for creating a good, stable platform for a game that hopefully has the foundations for the long haul. If they keep the pressure on and don't lose momentum they could have the last success of this generation of MMONGs.

[Roman Totale]

Bought - now to try and decide a class while it downloads.

[Joose]

Bought - now to try and decide a class while it downloads.

Don't worry too much about classes. Due to the soul system, and the fact that by about lvl 15 you can cheaply dual spec and get all the souls for that class, you could have just four characters and basically have access to all the class options in the entire game.

As far as I can tell, race choice is almost entirely cosmetic. They do have race specific powers, but they are not all that special compared to class abilities.

[Roman Totale]

Bard!

[Joose]

Bard!