World of Warcraft

[Cryptic]

Whereas I, on the other hand, am hoping for a naming system akin to Star Wars Galaxies; I would hope that the naming procedure is taken entirely out of players' hands and left to a random generator filled with names of the appropriate flavor. Select from an infinite number of names, until you find one to your liking.

Many players with good, creative names would howl with indignation, but I personally find adventuring alongside Sir Balthus, Sir Tristram, H/\KK0R-O\/\/Nz-J00 and Isolde of Aquitaine to be a little annoying.

Hmm... I think we've succeeded in underlining the fact that different games appeal to different styles of play.
:P

[whyBish]

Another way to look at it is that the company is being paid to host the server that you play on and store the data so that nothing can happen to it.

There is also the interesting idea of franchising out the server code. Let some other company license the server code for a fee, and then they can host it themselves with their own pay scales. This allows the price to match supply and demand locally rather than internationally. This is not even neccessary to be the model for the whole product lifestyle, but would be especially useful at the waning end of the lifecycle.

[Swiss Mercenary]

From what it seems to me from that review, is that most of the game will be played in "Personally-created" dungeons; Only your party may enter them. To me, that seems too much like Diablo 2, with more then 8 players. You can either play private games, or pub...

From what I have seen, I'll keep my 10$, no thank you. Whether the game will be released unfinished, or not won't mean much if that would be what the gameplay is. Diablo 2 won't be going anywhere, now, will it?

[Cryptic]

The "instance" system is being created to prevent one of the worst side-phenomenons of MMORPGs, camping. Imagine if, in D2, there was only one Baal per server (since the world is persistent). And that there were powerful items that only Baal could drop. So, you resign yourself, and enter the Baal region, because you really want a chance at those items. You fight your way through to the Throne of Destruction, and there you find 6 other players, all from the same guild; they hostile you and tell you to back off, because they're waiting for Baal to respawn and their guild needs the item more than you.
:angry:

To solve this, the "instance" system allows multiple (even competing) groups to be in the same dungeon at the same time. You can invite outsiders into your instance, so there's no problem with making new friends; and everyone else in different instances of the same dungeon cannot interfere with your quest. It may sound strange, but it's actually a very good compromise; you can play alone, or only with your friends, or only with new friends of your choosing, or you can wait for a group to invite you (especially if your skill set is needed or you're interesting and polite), etc. The alternative is to either fracture the game world into party-sized snips (in which case it would be just like D2), or to walk into a dungeon and find it cleared out with three other groups getting nasty toward each other while they mop up the scraps.

I think this example shows just how much thought the designers have put into the gameplay implementation; it's one example of many. But I can see how it wouldn't appeal to everyone. (For example, the campers, griefers, eBay sellers, and PKers are going to hate it.)

[WarLocke]

the "instance" system allows multiple (even competing) groups to be in the same dungeon at the same time

Actually, the whole instancing idea worked pretty well in Anarchy Online (the only game I've played that uses it), but dungeons/missions there were more the "1 to 4 players" type. I don't know how it'd hold up with 6 or 8+ person groups.

[Cryptic]

WoW bashers, I find your lack of faith disturbing.
:P

[NiteFox]

Please don't post that picture ever again. Laughter is supposed to make you live longer and at this rate I'll be waking up every night to take a midnight piss for the next hundred and twenty years :)

[WarLocke]

... I couldn't resist.

And hey, it's kind of on-topic! B)

[Swiss Mercenary]

Yes, I realise why the system is there, but to me, I fail to see much difference between that, and the system of Private/public games/channels diablo 2 uses. I fail to see what exactly makes WoW a "MMORG", while Diablo 2 is (Erronously-called) an RPG.

[Quark]

As far as I know, the system isn't used everywhere. So if you're in a town, you'll see everyone and be able to do anything MM there, or throughout the various open lands. I'm not sure how often this system is used, but it sounds to me like it's limited to the Dungeon Crawl type areas.

Gamespy has a running article up, and it includes some interesting information about the treasure system. On screen, you only see items that you can pick up. Other loot simply does not exist according to your computer. Quest items multi-spawn (so people can do quests together and not get screwed on the reward), and party-members not in the quest will never see the item. The three modes of the loot system determine how the rest of the treasure is split up. "Free for All" - first person to "click" the monster gets it. "Round-Robin" - party members split turns getting items". "Master Looter" - one person gets everything and can divide it himself.

I'm still curious at how this will interact when parties meet up with each other, that's when real problems can occur.

[Raziel]

From what it seems to me from that review, is that most of the game will be played in "Personally-created" dungeons; Only your party may enter them. To me, that seems too much like Diablo 2, with more then 8 players. You can either play private games, or pub...

This is what I get for not reading many reviews of WoW!!!

Really? Private dungeons? Awesome. That's the make or break feature for me. MMORPG, but you can leave the MM part behind.

[Yuen]

As far as I know, the system isn't used everywhere. So if you're in a town, you'll see everyone and be able to do anything MM there, or throughout the various open lands. I'm not sure how often this system is used, but it sounds to me like it's limited to the Dungeon Crawl type areas.

Town/city = see everyone.

Epic Dungeon = entire dungeon instanced.

Standard Dungeon = only "boss rooms" instanced.

This makes sense as if your party was entering an epic dungeon (Black Rock Mountain), it would totally kill the atmosphere for it to be crowded with other people. You are supposed to be entering this dangerous, ancient, mythical place after all. Therefore your party should be all alone to enhance the feeling of isolation.

In a standard dungeon it is logical that you should run into like minded adventurers. However if the whole reason you were going into a dungeon was to get the treasure from the boss mobs, then you don't want to wait in a line to kill them. Also instancing the boss room allows for customization and scripting of the boss mob fight that otherwise would be impossible in a non instanced environment.

In a city you want a busy crowded environment.

[Cryptic]

Some interesting bits from the official forums:

Q: How will “griefers” be handled in the game?
A: While the GM team is still working on formal guidelines, I was told that it’s safe to say anyone who is intentionally trying to distract from a player’s gaming experience will be dealt with and disciplinary action will be taken.

Q: Will WoW be playable on a Mac and are people currently testing it on Macs?
A: Yes, to both. The game will be available on a Mac and there are people currently playing on Macs. Minimum specifications have not yet been determined.

Q: When a warrior fights will he just stand there swinging a sword or will he have combat moves?
A: There are currently six to eight combat moves per stance with multiple stances available for warriors.

Q: How many servers will there be when WoW is released and what are the server names?
A: There will be a *lot* of servers. Names have not yet been assigned to them.

Q: What will you do to prevent cheating?
A: The development team is currently doing everything it can to eliminate the possibility of cheating. Also, because the game requires gamers to have a personal account to play, we will be able to identify and track cheaters much more closely. World of Warcraft has many features specifically designed to detect, identify and prevent cheating and hacking in the game. Additional resources - particularly the implementation of a live team of Gamemasters to monitor play - will provide security far beyond what we can currently offer for Battle.net®. As always, we will constantly look for ways to make the experience of our customers better and more secure, and as we continue to find new methods of doing so, we will certainly pursue and implement them.

Q: Will player names be unique on each Realm?
A: Yes. In order to promote individuality, World of Warcraft will feature an advanced naming system allowing players to create a unique name for their characters on each Realm.

Q: What type of PvP will you offer?
A: We know that the player vs. player (PvP) option is very important to many gamers. Therefore, we plan to incorporate a form of player conflict into the World of Warcraft. However, players who do not wish to be participate in PvP combat will not be required to do so. The PvP system will be incorporated in a consensual way that will be fun for those who wish to take part in this form of combat. Announcements regarding PvP options in the World of Warcraft will be announced in the months ahead.

[whyBish]

WoW bashers, I find your lack of faith disturbing.

Isn't faith just believing in something when no tangible evidence exists? :P

[kandrathe]

However, players who do not wish to be participate in PvP combat will not be required to do so.

Interesting change of philosophy for this new game.

[Quark]

Interesting change of philosophy for this new game.

A quite necessary one, if you ask me.

[Jarulf]

I've got to go with Drasca on that one, nobody has seen the real game or even played the beta, so nobody knows how the real game will be :o

Without saying to much, Blizzard have actually posted themselves in their forum that there has been external alpha testers (but as someone said, technically not beta).

[Drasca]

I'm sorry I don't have a link on me, but there was an gaming website Blizzard invited to play (on Blizzard's terms) and show off to. Blizzard let the Magazine gaming website to help spread hype and interest for fanboys and other potential customers. Yes, external alpha testing indeed. Good for hype. Good for publicility, when controlled.

Blizzard's got a lot of polish and promises, but my Wallet's Supreme Court is out for deliberation until the evidence is finalized. I for one, like the ideas presented, but will wait because I know better (now).

[Guest]

At Gencon Blizz let everybody who wlked in play the game, take pictures and write reports.

The general consensous was that while aspects clearly were not finished, the core game was. Most players felt it was far beyond most betas and many felt that it was actually more fun than MMORPs on the market.


Of course you should wait till its released to decide if its for you, but to act like it might be a porly made game or even vaporware is naive at this point.

[Swiss Mercenary]

You can not judge a game from even two days worth of playing.