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:
Off-Week Update (for Ep. 19)
You know, I think it makes slightly more sense to do these on Thursday. I dunno.
First up, I’m glad you all seemed to enjoy my April Fool’s video. As I mentioned on twitter, I mostly just like being able to be goofy, and I don’t want to be overall malicious, like claiming I’m ending the series, or mentioning something equally believable. I prefer over the top, goofy things. The kind of things you WOULD have to be a fool to believe.
OK, so yeah, three videos in the span of a week. DON’T get used to it. A lot of these were pre-planned, especially the April Fool’s video.
As for the new addition of the “Sidequest”, this pretty much spawned entirely from Julien giving me the free trial to SWTOR. Yes, I do plan to do more, but besides to fill the gap after next week, I won’t be posting them on any regular schedule. Next up is the Closed Beta of “Brick-Force”, a game that debuted in Closed Beta only a week or so ago…. as long as my beta key is still valid…
I will accept beta keys for other games to do for Sidequest, but if you wish to send me a key, make certain that it’s not a key with an expiration date first. If it does have a usage time, contact me first to let me know you have one, so it doesn’t go to waste. For example, Julien’s SWTOR key needed to registered within 14 days or the key would become invalid.
Finally as far as the OFFICIAL episode goes… eh. Champions. It’s out of the way and I sure as shit ain’t looking forward to DC Universe (no, it’s not next.) My issue is that there’s something about these Superhero MMOs that brings out… rage in people, I don’t know.
My only real complaints I’ve received are about my remark concerning the powers and how they worked in Freeform. Normally I don’t mention how paid content works, but the only reason I mentioned Freeform in this review is to relay a personal experience I had. I didn’t really explain myself in the video, but it seems my main claim if “Ice is a tanking power” is what got the major reaction. When I say that Ice was a tanking power, I didn’t say it was a worthless power for damage, (which many infer I did say) but it’s not played like a mage. It doesn’t have the range, it doesn’t have the power, and if you place your stats into “mage” skills, it doesn’t work. Each power has a very specific stat that needs to be focused upon in order to function properly. I didn’t learn this through experience, I learned this through a massive strategy guide I was reading through at Best Buy, and I generally felt that creative control over your powers were limited. The story was just an anecdote. I wasn’t trying to say Freeform was worthless, or Ice was limited. I was only saying that if you’re coming from CoH, or another MMO, you need to be careful how you set up your character.
Regardless, progress on the next episode script is going well. Today was a complete wash, but hopefully I’ll make more progress tomorrow, and have it ready to go on time. That’s the beauty of the simpler games… there’s much less to “miss”.
Episode 20 on the other hand…
(Bonus “Oops I forgot to add this” addendum:)
For those of you wondering what the hell I was referencing in my end credits quote, MegaGWolf and I created a short Machinima for the hell of it and to promote the Champions episode. So I figured I’d share it here:
The Suggested MMO List is finally updated
Yes, after… who knows HOW long, I finally got around to updating the Suggested MMO List. I’d normally talk about this kind of thing in the Off-Week Update, but considering I literally spent the entire day working on it, I think it’s deserves its own mention.
Here’s the major changes:
Updated with every suggestion I could find.
I might have missed a few, or just plain didn’t count them as MMOs. (i.e. Heroes of Newerth is another MOBA, and I explicitly stated in the League of Legends review that MOBAs are not MMOs. Also I keep having to say this, but I don’t count Team Fortress 2 as an MMO. Not that that’s going to stop anyone from suggesting it again.) If you have one you suggested but it’s not on there, consider that one of the options, but feel free to suggest it again if it does fit the definition and I just missed it.
Split the games into categories, “Downloadable”, “Browser-Based”, and “Free-to-Try”.
Downloadable MMOs are priority one on MMO Grinder.
Since Browser-based are harder to record, and very often don’t exactly follow MMO formulas or merely don’t have much content, they may only occasionally appear as Official episodes, or will appear if I ever get around to making a Browser-Based spin-off.
“Free-to-Try” MMOs are MMOs that claim to be Free-to-Play, but severely limit you in gameplay. I consider these “unlimited trials”. See the likes of “WoW” and “Wakfu”. Grinder eps might be done on these, but with the “Cash Shop” portion changed to reflect subscription/purchase benefits.
Deleted nearly all the comments.
General consensus among the comments from the last off-week update was that it made perfect sense to delete the comments once the list was updated. I left two comments there for two reasons. One provided a link to the soundtrack of the game suggest, and that would really help me out when it comes time to look at that one, and the other had a warning for another game that had major security issues. Comments that suggest a game only, or talk in depth about a game on the list will be deleted once the list has been properly updated. I apologize for that, but the page was becoming a severe mess and I couldn’t let it continue on like that.
Please keep all suggestions to either my e-mail address (mmogrinder@live.com) or the Suggested MMO List as I all too often see suggestions popping up in other areas. Exceptions will be made for posts like this, regular episodes, and off-week updates, but please do not post suggestions on the Episode Guide, About, or F.A.Q. pages.
Speaking of upcoming pages, I’d like to eventually get the Terminology page set up. What kind of terms that I’ve used, or that you’ve heard me use would you like to see on there? Right now I’m planning on including not only common MMO terms, but terms I’ve made up, like “Microsoft Points Syndrome”. Please leave comments here about what terms you want to see on that page, just so I can add to the list I’m already thinking of.
I know this is earlier than usual…
…but I just HAD to get the word out about this…. thing. You might want to avoid it at all costs, but those brave enough to check it out… well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
MMO Grinder 