So it seems the in-thing to write an InProgress review for MMOs and in the spirit of the kool kidz I'm going to try and do something similar.
- Damn do I feel old writing that!
Anyway, I'm guessing there's little point right now in going over what Wildstar is; I've already covered that in a previous post and will no doubt again in roughly a week's time.
Plus no doubt if you are reading this then you already know about the game.
So to keep it short and sweet let's just say it's a Space Opera with themes that relate back to high sci-fi, Star Wars and Firefly, all wrapped up in your favourite Saturday morning cartoon!
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So today sees the official launch date for this game, and no doubt you are asking yourselves just what you should expect from this game.
Well technically the game is not the same games from 5+ years ago. The developers are not Blizzard and they have no delusions that the game will require a modern computer to run.
I'm not sure if this is a negative thing, the game looks very pretty and they have not cut corners when it comes to characters and environment like another MMO that I won't mention but has a similar 'cartoony' graphic style.
I can run this game on max with a frame rate similar to The Secret World, so you can expect similar if you are a TSW player (and if not, why not?).
A few weeks ago this was not the case, but the developers Carbine have been busy for the past few weeks really optimising the game and plugging all those annoying memory leaks.
The Headstart launch was problematic for some, but for me; going straight to the PvE RP server, I had next to no problems that were not ironed out within a few hours!
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The game does have a very interesting story, and playing both Exile and Dominion side gives a wide range of missions from the mundane "kill X number of Y", the more interesting - but often lacking 'something' human interest missions, and then the truly epic "I feel like a badass!" missions.
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Like with many MMOs out at the moment, you get out of the game what you put in.
During beta I was determined to play the game purely as a tester, I was skimming over the quest text purely to get the gist and to allow me to report spelling and grammar mistakes.
When it came to playing the game itself I would run as fast as possible to the mission site and try to break it as fast as possible.
The number of bugs I found were noticeable, each of them reported and thankfully fixed with the following build.
The point was, I was not immersing myself into the background of the game, and after a few evenings of playing this way I got bored very quickly...
This isn't to say the game suffers from being used as a mindless hack n slash, far from it as there are always things to do.
No, the problem was that is not how I enjoy games! The moment however I took a step back and took in the environments, the war zones with craters and fox-holes, the dilapidated slums, the lush greenery and xenobotany; I very quickly wanted to see more, to take a pause from the awesome mechanics and IN YOUR FACE humour and just soak in the camaraderie crossed with the bitter loss of ongoing conflict.
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Speaking of conflict, I should probably explain the different sides you'll be playing with:
The Dominion
These are the Empire from Star Wars made up of the following races:
The Mechari
Robots who were created by an ancient demigod race.
The Cassians
Humans (if humans were all nobility extras from Blackadder the Third)
The Draken
Ferocious reptilian creatures with scaled skin, pointy tails and cruel horns.
The Chua
Space Gerbils who's cuteness is offset with a psychotic evil.
The Exiles
These are the Rebel Alliance from Star Wars, made up of the following races:
The Humans
Yup both sides have humans. If the Cassians are the British, these are the Americans, complete with southern hick accent.
The Aurin
Hippy bunny boys & girls with big ears, big eyes and long furry tails. They like trees.
The Granok
Rock men. Big rock chests, big rock jaws. Big...Strong...Hands...
The Mordesh
Space Zombies filled with neon fluid for blood.
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Last but not least, the games combat uses devices called 'telegraphs'. This is essentially a projection on the ground showing where your attack will hit. By using a combination of abilities and movement tricks you as the player can manipulate this placement so that you can try to capture as many NPCs in each telegraph in order to maximise your damage and end the enemy as quickly as possible.
What this gives you is a slightly different style of combat to what you have probably come to expect from many MMOs, but it is hard to explain without going into the finer details which I would like to leave until next week.
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So that's where we are at the moment. I hope this has been remotely helpful in giving you an idea of what to expect.
So until next time; stay safe and I'll see you Cryptside!
- Your friendly neighbourhood Doctor Loxley
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