Off-week Update (For Ep. 21)
Again, I missed the off-week update from last week, so I’ll give a quick rundown.
Elsword was WAY MORE well received than I thought it would be. I think that’s in no small part due to someone posting the review in the official forums for that game. It was another conversation that teetered between positive and annoyed until I showed up in the thread, and it tipped mostly toward the positive. I don’t know what that says about people in general.
Of course, the real reason we’re here, is Episode 20, which I kept mysterious until last week, even making sure not to reveal the game in the title or the title card. I hope I did surprise a lot of people with that. My reasoning for revealing it was due to the fact I didn’t think many people would click on “ChaosD1: Episode 20” when they saw my video in the sidebar of TGWTG, and I was going to reveal it later anyway.
I’m going to clear up a few things about this episode and why I did it.
- The Horde/Alliance exclusivity on PvP servers has been lifted.
In what I consider my traditional screw up per video, I stated that Alliance and Horde characters could not be both made on a PvP server. This WAS indeed the case when I was still playing. Since Blizzard seems absolutely adamant on making the Alliance and Horde fight, this is something I didn’t bother to check because if they left it that way for nearly 6 years, why change it? Well, they did, and I feel stupid for including it now. - “Will you review (insert pay-to-play MMOhere) now?”
No. This is and pretty much always will be a free-to-play review show/guide. There are several dozen reasons I chose WoW, the first and foremost I explained in the review for those who actually listened to it. And remember this game has an unlimited free trial, so anyone looking to play the game without paying for it, still technically can. So, no, I will not do Grinders on FFXI, FFXIV, Eve Online, or any other MMO that offers a trial that doesn’t last as long as I’m willing to put up with the restrictions. They MAY qualify for a Sidequest, but that’s hardly what the people asking me to review these games want. In fact, WHY do people want me to look at games they already play anyway? Because when that happens, all I get is an endless parade of nitpicking. It’s getting to the point that the more requested a game is, F2P or not, the LESS likely I’m going to look at it. - “Why did you go over this in such detail? We already know all this!”
The game is practically a framework for the modern fantasy MMOs now. The reason this review was so long and redundant (I think some people missed that point as well.) is because I wanted to strip the game’s mechanics bare, and have people listening to the explanation, especially people who’ve been watching my show for a long time, sit there and go… “Wait… that’s just like what he said about (Eden Eternal, LOTRO, etc.)!” And for those who actually did get annoyed at me telling people about how WoW works in painstakingly surplus detail? This video wasn’t for you. There ARE a lot of people who haven’t played WoW, and there are a lot of people who enjoy my show, but DON’T play every MMO, or possibly ANY MMOs on the market. This whole thing was created simply to show those people what the most basic MMO formula is, and why I reference the game so much in my reviews. In fact, Tyger’s video tries to explain the same thing…
I’d love to let you know how my current game, Project Powder is going, but for some mysterious reason, I CAN’T LOG INTO IT ANYMORE. Luckily, it was simple enough to get the gist of after a few days of play, but expect Episode 21 to be a SHORT episode. Not Sidequest short, but… it probably won’t be a third of the WoW review. Hopefully the ticket I sent to the support over on Outspark will be resolved and I’ll be able to get back in before the dead line, just for supplemental purposes. Although the form letter response I got (taken from a similar issue from another Outspark game, mind you) doesn’t bode well for this possibility.
If anything, though, you can at least look forward to a collaboration video I’m working on with another CA reviewer. Yes, that’s all I’m saying about that.
I have to once again thank Andrew Dickman for illustrating the comic I used in the review, especially when he was so swamped with 1000 other better things he could have been doing. I also plan on using the same image in another video, but for now, here’s the pic. Yes, this actually happened:
Posted on May 3, 2012, in News and Updates and tagged gaming. Bookmark the permalink. 3 Comments.
MMO Grinder 
My husband and I were on Argent Dawn. We can relate.
The battlecry of our server was “RP stands for RAID PROGRESSION!!!!1!”
(Is there a reason we can’t login though Disqus?)
I liked Tyger’s video and agree with him on just about everything concerning SWTOR. I tried it for free one weekend, but didn’t feel I could justify paying the box price on top of a subscription fee. It felt just like LOTRO, Rift, and the 5 minutes or so that I played of WoW’s free trial. I had done all of that stuff already. I also agree that while people comparing games I like to WoW might bum me out, it’s definitely not an excuse to blow up at someone, or act like an otherwise elitist jerk. If someone is going to get so offended by such discussions, then they should brush up on their debate skills and calmly make truthful points about why their game is so different from WoW. I’ll have to check out the rest of his show. he may have just taught me to respect people who wear their hats backwards.
I’ll say he has a decent reason for wearing his hat the way he does.
When Tyger and I were post posting regularly in the forums, a lot of people immediately compared his show and mine, although Tyger doesn’t review as much as he editorializes, even his “review” episodes spend more time on the aspects of the culture than the actual game. (Case in point, check “America’s Army” where he discusses his feeling on how a true firefight experience cannot be replicated in a First Person Shooter, and the controversy of the game being nothing more than a recruitment tool.) Just be prepared to hear a lot about paintball. That’s his forte, and he’s well known in the Paintball community.