Officially Cancelled

So about five minutes ago I officially cancelled my membership to Warhammer Online.  My account will still be active for 12 more days, but it's highly unlikely that I'll ever sign-in again.  Rest in Peace, Lexaeus.

Part of me feels a bit of remorse for not being compelled by the game.  I was really excited about it from the get-go, but, alas, it failed to captivate me.  Rather than go into a sort of mini-review of the game focusing on what it didn't give me, I'll try to discuss what I didn't give to the game.  I think we approached this whole experiment all wrong, expecting too much from a game that launched only two weeks before we started playing.  I certainly invested a considerably amount of time playing the game, trying to fall in love with it.  I think my lack of experience with MMOs in general made it hard for me to become engrossed.  For about the first two weeks, I had close to no idea what I was doing, simply running around, questing, and engaging in random battles.   I think most of my experience with the game was random fiddling, as opposed to actually trying to process what was going on regarding the interface and all that good stuff.  

I admit, I enjoyed myself when playing with my fellow WarJammers, but that's probably because I had some general idea of what I was trying to accomplish.  For the most part, that goal involved things that weren't exactly in-game "norms."  So did I master the game mechanics of Warhammer?  Not at all.  Did I master a sort of counterplaying?  Probably.  To be fair, this doesn't allow me to justify calling it a "bad game."  Frankly, I wouldn't have the slightest idea of what would constitute a "good" MMO.  

I didn't hate my gameplay experience, but rather didn't quite understand it.  I actually gained some sort of insights about MMOs from the experiments, but the times I actually sat down to play didn't enlighten me much, probably because I was spending too much time trying to figure out what I was trying to do.  The learning curve was a little steep, and I'm sure that's the primary thing that turned me off of the game.  It may be something applicable to MMOs in general.  As I've made pretty clear, this was my first experience with one.  Suffice to say, the genre could benefit from being a little more "n00b friendly" if it wants to step away from the stereotype associated with it.

Another crux, which is inherently related to my last epiphany, was the splitting of the teams.  All the noobs were on one side, the MMO "experts" on the other. (Shhh.  I need to justify Chaos' embarrassing performance in the skirmishes for my own ego's sake.)  Had we split up more intelligently, that may have done something to ease the learning curve.

All in all, I don't regret having played one bit.  I was exposed to a whole new [online] culture, populated with players ranging from defensive fanatics to bored newbies like myself.  I just feel my experience could have been more beneficial had I actually been able to understand what was going on.  As other WarJammers have already pointed to the game's pitfalls, I don't feel it's necessary to elaborate on that.  As a moderately competent gamer in other genres, I can attest and agree with most of their complaints.  But overall, I feel Warhammer, and MMOs in general, require a certain degree of experience and familiarity with the genre.

Let there be... SOUND!

Up to this point, the computers in Sudikoff didn't have the drivers installed for the speakers.  So, unfortunately, for these first weeks, we've had to play Warhammer in silence.  But tonight, as I logged onto the computer, I was shocked to hear that old Windows XP sign-on chime.  "WE HAVE SOUND NOW?!" I cried to the empty room... So as soon as I booted up Warhammer, I watched the opening FMV and basked in the sounds of the old woman's narration, the clashing of weapons, and grunts and screams of agony.  I was sooo sure this addition would add to my experience with the game.  After about 10 minutes of playing, I realized it didn't.  My avatar made the same ugly grunt with every attack.  The NPC's all talked in the same faux-spooky voice that was eerily reminiscent of Darth Sidious from Star Wars.  There was no soundtrack... just the sound of my character running and grunting... and the occasional random howl from a wolf that wanted to fight me.

Needless to say, I shut the speakers off and went back into silent-Warhammer-while-bumping-some-funky-fresh-tunes-from-my-iPod-mode...

Intervention in the Inevitable City

Today we all traveled to the Inevitable City to stage a sort of intervention for addicted gamers. The first person I came across was a bit of a newbie to the game, having only been playing for about 5 days. He claims to have some minor experience with MMOs, and likes the RvR aspect of Warhammer. He doesn't feel like he'll get addicted, but I'll try to keep an eye out for him to see if I notice any extreme leveling or other activities indicative of addictions.

Another player I encountered was a level 21. He claims to only play 30-60 minutes on weekdays and a few hours on the weekends. He gave me some interesting feedback. "Addiction is when you have a level 40 and start over with a new character... or stay in on Halloween. =)"

After the mini-interventions, we held a peace party on the beach and did one-on-one duels with one another, a la Fight Club.  It attracted some attention, as we got some non-WarJammers to participate.  It was exciting, to say the least, to play the game in a manner contrary to what the developers intended.

Part of me is still confused and trying to get used to this game.  I feel like I'm doing SOMETHING when we engage in our experiments, but otherwise it's all still so confusing...

Increase the Peace... Pretty Please?

So I got into Sudikoff around 10:00pm tonight and did some questing while the group organized itself. On my own, I'm still not much of a fan of the melee battle system. It could be because I'm still a relatively low level and haven't unlocked all the awesome abilities. Or maybe I just suck. I was attacked by 3 wild boar things and by the 3rd, my action points and health were dangerously low. As shameful as it sounds, I got slaughtered by a piggy. :[

But once the rest of the WarJammers got in on the action, things changed drastically. We met on an empty beach and tried to start our peace protest. We met some resistance and were chastised for seeking peace in a game with "war" in the title. People attacked anyway and would run-off laughing. At one point we were even called hippies. Literally.

We played a couple scenarios together and met up on a small splotch of land that we dubbed "Peace Island." We stood there, waved, did special moves, and took a dip in the ocean, all the while racking up tons of experience from the people who were actually playing the scenario. We invited people to our island and chill with us, but no one seemed interested. The funny thing, though, is that we are apparently not alone. When we shouted to the scenario members about our peace party, we received a response from someone who claimed to have their own peace coalition. Rival peace factions? A little counter intuitive if I do say so myself.

This is the first time I actually felt like I was doing something in the game. Normally, I get annoyed by just wandering, fighting, and questing. But this time I felt like I was actually contributing to the in-game society, especially by attempting to rebel against its typical social norms. I found it pretty funny that some people take the game so seriously. One of our assailants mocked us and said something along the lines of "Peace is for the weak!" and when we asked another why she didn't wanna join our cause, she replied with "Because I'm a bad*** b****!" Psh. Looks like finding candidates for intervention won't be too difficult.

WarJammers... could that be our next step?

Disciple to Marauder

So tonight was my first night playing since the server switch. Back on Sea of Malice, I was bored with Xehanort, my Disciple of Khaine, because of his mediocre melee attack style. Sure, once you max him out he's probably amazing, but I don't have the patience for that. So I created Lexaeus, a Marauder, this time around (I owe you something totally amazing if you know the origin of my characters' names, by the way.)

So I noticed I was able to progress much faster this time around. I got to level 5 in just over 3 hours. But, again, after about an hour or so of gameplay I got bored again. Something about the battle system in this game is very blah to me. I'm used to being able to chain massive combos when I do melee stuff, but here it's like.. *hit* *wait 2 seconds* *hit* *wait*...... until your opponent is dead. Gets pretty tedious, especially when the experience earned per battle doesn't do jack to your progress. I find myself avoiding battle in between quests because a) it's kind of overkill and b) it slows me down more than anything. Quests are obviously the way to go, but when they center around fighting the same minions over and over again... more boredom.

My highlight was being slaughtered by the giant dragon thing in the public quest. I'd throw my axe at it and it'd come rushing at me and chase me until I died. Oops? But the quest was a fun way to interact with other people. I used the chat function for the first time.

Me: How do we kill this thing?
Other guy: Need sum healerz.

I also learned how to be a butcher, so if I want, I can kill random animals in the forest and take stuff from them. I attacked a stag and it just stood there and let me attack it and simply toppled over when I killed it. I felt guilty. :[ I might invest in a less gruesome skill, like cultivation, because my conscience will eventually get the better of me.

Either way, I'm halfway to this week's requirement and am semi-excited for this weekend's skirmish.

Honestly, I'm not a big fan of the in-game mechanics. I think the only thing keeping me going is the potential to slaughter the "pros" (i.e. Order). So... Addicted? Not really. Competitive much? Totally.

Longest Patcher

So my computer took the longest to patch and boot-up the game. Booooo. I was forced to be tortured by watching all of my fellow WarJammers play and do quests and level up and do all this amazing stuff. All the while, I got to sit and watch my progress bar fill up. Yayyyy...

But when my game finally loaded (about an hour and a half after everyone else's, mind you) and I got to create my Disciple of Khaine, I realized it was totally worth the wait. I was thrust into this dark realm, emerging from this creepy looking ship thing. I wandered, started some quests ranging from things as simple as climbing to the top of a hill to something as brutal as murdering innocent white lions, and before I knew it, the rest of my crew had checked out for the evening. I finished up at level 4 for the night (not bad for someone COMPLETELY new to the MMO world, eh?).

Now bedddddtime. I have math in the morning.