My review: 65%

[elikal]

Vanguard – A sort of review


by Elikal

Reviewing Vanguard (VG) honestly is like cutting off the head of a hydra: Just when you think you’re done, two new heads of peril pop up. The game has so many aspects and angles, it is quite a chore to explain someone Vanguard who has not yet played it. Vanguard – Saga of Heroes was a saga in it’s making in the truest meaning of the word, and most likely will remain so. One can not understand Vanguard fully, without digging a bit into it’s making.

Vanguard was designed by the folks of Sigil, who once left Sony (SOE) and the Everquest team to pursue their own “vision”. But, as ever so often with visions, it must stand against reality, and sometimes the reality check is a painful thing. Vanguard is essentially a game with great potential, and never has this phrase been truer. VG chief developer Brad McQuaid himself, in a sure to be appreciated move of honesty, admitted that the game was released about half a year too early, because they got out of funds. Now we have seen many solo RPGs rushed in the last years, and it is easy to see a premature launch can cause great damage to an otherwise good game. Whether or not this is the case for VG remains to be seen, but chances are about 50/50 for failure or success.

Vanguard has been in planning and making for about five years. Back then, a lot of players had Everquest I and Ultima Online as gamers background, and still recalled this time as their golden era of MMO gaming. But times have changed, and so has the average target audience of gaming. Back in EQ1 days MMOs were filled entirely by students and pupils; that was the niche of gaming. You just can't fill MMOs with them now. Back then we had DOS and Windows 3.1. People were USED to make many things by themselves, but we have 2007 and, well, computers and games have changed. I know, if life is easygoing school or student life, it may be hard to imagine that some have that 40+ hours week, coming home after fighting your boss and your colleagues, you just don’t want to die 20 times with corpse runs, because you already have a hardcore LIFE. That is what VG claimed to reanimate, largely supported by the quite aggressive vocal expression of the VG developers. The way they talked about VG as a hardcore game has attracted a vocal and aggressive minority of players, who hold the “old days” of gaming in their hearts as the best era and condemn all modernization that happened since then in gaming; people who find journals or ingame maps as a feature for weaklings and carebears.

The game that changed everything

Then World of Warcraft happened. The debates about how to judge this game have not ended after all the years, but definitely by the sheer number of discussions you can safely say it hit the MMO world like a comet. After WoW EVERYTHING about what a MMO could be was forever changed and re-defined. One of the developers of WoW, when asked what was their recipe for making such a successful game, he said: we checked all features and asked ourselves "is this fun to do?", and if the answer is No, its out. Not realism, not logic, only is it fun! Now you may like or hate the result, but when the day is over, all that counts in the end is: are the shareholders happy or not? And 8 million players surely made Blizzard stockholders quite happy. So asking, what makes the average gamer happy is likely on the top agenda here - or it should be, if the game does not want to vanish like Dark and Light or RF Online. Vanguard was an expensive development, is HAS to pay off big time, like it or not. It obviously took Sigil a lot of time to realize, that their “vision” did just not have the power to make their stockholders as happy as they could be, but the prestige had been set in stone: VG is a hardcore game. It took them a long time, as the painful beta 3 NDA breaches showed, to make VG from a hardcore chore of the “vision” to a game with a realistic degree of accessibility for any normal gamer. This is the core problem which plagues VG now. It has still a lot of reminiscences to the old hardcore “vision” and the demands of the market reality. And that is the one true reason VG is far behind schedule and has spent the money, forcing them now to publish a totally unfinished product.

VG is by and large an unfinished product. Many core features are not implemented at all, like the fellowship, who allows XP sharing, or the caravans, which are supposed to make the vast travel times easier. It is a strange twist that mostly those features are not in the game, who are supposed to make it easier accessible. I have seen my share of MMO launches, but the sheer amount of bugs, not implemented features, not tested quests and not balanced areas really exceeds anything I have ever seen. About one third of the entire world have not been tested in the last beta phase at all, and thus are in the game now totally untested. An average of 30% of all quests have bug stoppers, mobs that will not drop the appropriate loot or kills, which do not count. Now I am aware Sigil has made many patches, each with a long list of changes. But if you examined them from the last days of beta to the present, 90% of changes were class reworking and other secondary changes. The real substantial changes, like bug fixing, always made only a very small part of every patch. And surely we can not expect miracles. Bug fixing IS a lengthy and tiresome process. The cost and time of the last 5% of bugs in software as a rule are as high as the fixes for the other 95%, so it will take a LONG time until a majority of bugs will be eliminated. Strangely a great part of patches contain dozens of arbitrary changes like putting a ranger spell from level 4 to level 10, as if they did not have more important things to do.

The most beautiful world

What is definitely breathtaking and the biggest bonus is the world itself. It is without exaggeration the most beautiful and breathtaking world we have seen, likely in any computer game ever. The three existing continents have so many different, wonderful places, sights and designs, it would be worth the money alone for seeing all the sceneries. Vast cities like Aghram or New Torgonor, are easily the most wonderful cities I have ever seen in 20 years gaming. The dark side however is, they are also easily the most lifeless I have seen. If you enter Qeynos (EQ2) or Stormwind (WoW) or Mos Eisley (SWG), you feel the place is alive. People and critter, womp rats, rabbits or sea gulls fill the place with life. Children pass by and play, people get into an argument, THINGS happen around you to simulate life. Entering the cities of Vanguard is mostly like entering a museum. NPCs are nailed down where they stand and barely animated at all. The further away you get from the starter areas the more lifeless the cities become. People love to gather in the cities of WoW, SWG or EQ2, but I can hardly imagine people will gather in New Torgonor, which feels like a graveyard – however the most beautiful. We can only hope this will change, but with the many other more pressing things at hand it is one of the features we won’t see for a long time.

The 19 classes and 15 races are fun to play and mostly well designed. Animations have greatly improved and now and nice to look. Not breathtaking, but the upper quality in MMO terms. It’s the animations for NPCs, especially in social places, which sorely lack. NPCs stand everywhere like frozen, as if some giant had dropped them out of a box and they had been glued down where they fell. Adding the fact they have all quite similar haircuts and clothing and no voiceovers, it really takes a lot of life out of this game. It is hard to imagine people meet and socialize in any place in this game now. While the world is surely breathtaking, it lacks the kind of focus of places like Goldshire in WoW, where you know people can always meet and greet, basically because everyone can reach it, and it is strategically placed.

Another novelty is, player starter areas are distributed all over the world. There is not only a difficult and long journey, often impossible for anyone below level 30, if you chose a certain race, the quite complicated faction system forces people who want to form a common guild and want to do quests together to all either chose the same race or forget about grouping together for a VERY long time. I can not make people delusions about levelling here. To gain levels is much slower than in any present title. It takes about the same time as in the nefarious Asian grinder Lineage II. That is not so much of a problem in the first 15 levels, since there are many quests, many of which are interesting and well designed. Sure, you have the usual chore of kill X amount of Z, but many interesting and funny quests also, to spice things up. Quests reveal a decent amount of background lore about the world, but it is not too deep and thrilling. If you start the game in any of the newbie areas, you are more or less tossed into a world and supposed to find your place. It is rather sad to see, how less welcoming the starter areas are in terms of story and character development are. Thinking about the detailed background you are given in EQ2 and it’s starter isle, you feel more like tossed into this world and are supposed to see for yourself where you belong. The feel of an ongoing story arc, which covers the entire world and where you can select your role in, is entirely missing. There is no worldwide story whatsoever; maybe in much later levels, but it is a big missed opportunity, and the meagre intro text window can hardly replace this.

Back to old school

Expect that the overall difficulty is higher as in WoW or EQ2. You need groups much more often, you die much easier and it has the corpse run. If you die and no one is there to resurrect you, you revive at an altar. There you can either summon your belongings by paying a small amount of money, loosing some XP and the gear looses some quality which needs to be repaired OR you reach the place where you died. Naked. No, you have some clothing, but without any gear. If you do this corpse run however your gear is not much damaged and you keep most XP. This is essentially nothing but a timesink, and in can be most tiresome in some dungeons. It is not that hard as it sounds, especially when you have people to help you. But it surely is a totally NO-NO for every person who has work and a normal, grown up schedule. Getting quests with the best XP and the best gear usually leads into difficult dungeons. And they are BIG. So if your group gets wiped, you can easily forget doing the rest of your 2-3 hours evening spare time anything else than sneaking into that dungeon and retrieving your corpse. It takes time, and that is likely a big reason for every casual player not to buy VG. Sure, you CAN summon your belongings, but in any dangerous dungeon you die several times, and since money and loot drop is not really abundant, any such evening can easily turn out more as investment than gain, if you call your corpse a few times. The repair cost are soon much higher than the income from the dungeon run itself. Also taken into account, that many areas are barely tested and need weeks or rather months of balancing. The dungeons in the first 15 levels in the various starter areas are so breathtakingly different in difficulty, there is a LOT of work to do in balancing as well. While you can walk through the Kurashasa starter area blindfolded, the first dungeon around Tanvu can easily kill a full group of the most experienced MMO gamers.

A big problem is also the high respawn rate in many areas, especially dense forests and dungeons. Mobs respawn much faster than any average group is able to remove them. Often I was in a dungeon, and when we just killed the two mobs in front of us, those behind us had already respawned. While my groups were able to proceed, it was a 2 hours silent chore. If you entirely lack the time even to exchange a few word the entire reason to enter a MMO is killed. Group adventuring just lives from small talk and short comments, and in many places it is even impossible to type “go left” until the next mob as already started to attack. Since I love to talk to people and not just silently fight, this is one of the aspects I really disliked the most about VG. Due to the tedious nature this ultra-fast respawn causes, a lot of players rather grind a few levels and then do group quests solo instead of finding groups. It is a strange and ironic thing, since the difficulty initially was designed to encourage grouping. But now it has been raised THAT high, that people rather come back when they are strong and fight it out alone instead of the greater risk going through those places with a group.
One of the really good features is the music. The soundtrack is very good and supports the areas perfectly. It is a pleasure to listen to and it’s that kind of soundtrack you want to have on CD. The ambient sound and sound effects however are sub-standard and a rather crude mix of 1990ies sound files.

The User Interface (UI) is to a vast degree a WoW clone, down to every key and command. That is in itself neither bad nor good, but the WoW UI wasn’t really one of the most advanced and in my opinion one of the biggest gripes I had with WoW. It is simple, functional but that’s all. The journal has no option to sort quests by type, region or difficulty. The character has no biography people can read, which tended to be a good way to get in touch with people. The map is the most barren and simplified I have seen. many quests still do not have waypoints, and the directions in the texts often are vague and misleading. Finding your aim can be quite a chore. In this feature, as in so many, the split between the hardcore “vision” and the reality check becomes visible. The original idea was not to implement maps at all. As a result, VG would never have started on more than two servers right away, so they started to make a “compromise” for “casual” players – or what a hardcore guy THINKS is casual. The result is a map, which is far too much for the hardcore players and far too less for the normal players, and that is exactly the misery in which VG is stuck in so many things.


Vanguard could be a really good game, if Sigil would listen less to the vocal minority who – partially only for the teenage fun of boasting – demand always greater difficulty, players for whom only perma-death is hard enough. The downside already has paid: on some servers the community is more aggressive than in any MMO I have seen, and I have played a lot. Some servers are ok, but even there you can hardly play 15 minutes without someone who criticizes some features is instantly yelled down by some “fans” he should “shut up and go play WoW”. I have never seen such an aggressive and immature mix of players as in VG. Sure, they aren’t the majority by far, but they vocally dominate the chat channels in many servers and Sigil has so far only moved against the most gross, personal attacks. I would love to see VG succeed, and I am sure many who play it now feel the same about it. But Sigil has to face the real priorities and the REAL core gamer, not some arbitrary but aggressively vocal minority. It is well advised to reveal the roadmap of the next weeks and months and not to fall into the trap to keep their plans a secret. There are just too many questions about whether something is bugged, too complicated to understand or simply “working as intended” and I doubt many players have the endless patience to wait a year for unknown makes-all-good-patches.

SWG was the last game who equally tried to satisfy traditional “hardcore” gamers and also attract new players with much less tolerance to tedium and chore. The NGE, trying to create such a compromise, was the greatest disaster the MMO world has seen to date. The end of the story is, I see another crew of idealistic developers with “visions” and “dreams”, lacking the down to earth pragmatism and the courage to accept the logic of the market. It is the unavoidable logic of capitalism, the only stable and foolproof prophecy - despite Mr. McQuaid's claim there were no prophets - and that it the success of greed. Greed lies in numbers, and as a matter of fact the number of hardcore fans is *quite* anti-proportional to the loudness of their voice. When WOW was launched the definition of what a MMO is has changed forever. SWG has ruined itself trying to be both hardcory and still adapting WOW-elements. Every attempt to make niches within niches, making games too inaccessible will doom any MMO to a miniature niche in mid terms. Not all WOW did was perfect, not all must be 100% done as in WOW to succeed, but the core idea has set an entirely new standard: shortest possible non-fun-times until the fun starts. That is the only winning formula that has a future now. "The avalanche has already started; it is too late for the pebbles to vote."

Conclusion

Graphics: The world is breathtaking, however the civilization does not feel alive but more like a painted stage, therefore no maximum value. Some textures and places at not up to the high standard. 7/10

Sound: Great music but no voiceover and quite outdated sound effects. 7/10

Difficulty: Many modern features are missing. Features which Sigil had planned to make the “challenge” bearable like Fellowships or Caravans are not implemented at all. There is a great imbalance in the various starter areas in terms of difficulty. Also some classes are much easier to play then others. The complicated faction system and the lack of any fast travel options force people to group only with those playing the same race for a long time. 4/10

Fun Factor: The quests are mindful and interesting. Many are quite beyond the usual kill X of Y. Crafting and Diplomacy add some fun things to do, even though they seem to lack the focus at the moment. Since both need a long time to delve in, they do not play a central role besides a bit fun gaming for a few days right now. Some quests are really entertaining and thoughtfully designed. 8/10

Character Customization: It almost equals the great character customization of SWG. You really have a lot of sliders to create your own character. However, the races tend to look a bit cloned, since there are no textures and no aging slider. Also extreme deformations have been taken out prior to launch, so no fat or extreme thin characters can be made anymore. Since at this moment there are only 4 haircuts for each race, this is not fully implemented as it is supposed. Since hair is a big feature to really look different, the potential is highly cut. 6/10

Reviewer’s Tilt: I am split how to judge the game. It has the potential to be a real hit, but Sigil must get to the grip fast! Nowadays players do not have the years of patience people had back in the SWG era, waiting for years for promises and unspoken “somethings we are adding at some time”. There are awesome things in this game, especially if you seek for a richer and deeper world, but much work needs to be done and if you play Vanguard, be sure to have thick hide and good nerves. For the majority I can only advise to wait half a year. 7/10

Overall: 6.5

[Jacosta]

My review of your review is -1000 times infinity. Let me know when you can design your own game based upon what you think is fun.

[trinix]

Good review. I don't agree but that's just how these things work out.

I must say I think you are expecting and want things that are either not this type of game or not in the mind of the devs.

I especially don't see how you can only give a 6 for sound because they didn't do voice-overs? Did you hear the music, it's a 10++. I'm not talking about stupid sound effects that are outdated, the music.

A review is fine, but I think you should consider also, the game might just not be what you are looking for. I see comments about stupid corpse runs, factions and stuff like that. It's a feature of the game, not a tweak they can either put on or off, it's not like should swords be blue or green or metal, it's how they designed the game.

All in all, I wish you best luck. Good written what you feel. I hope you can enjoy the game or find another game that will be better suited but with a 6.5 I think you are going to give it at least a try :). To Telon and beyond...

[Gutdog]

You say SWG was both hardcore and yet tried to bring in elements of WoW and because of this it failed?

SWG never had any hardcore side to it. I played it from the start and can remember other players running up to me asking me to kill them in PVP combat so they could get back to town quickly. This was before any of the big changes which only made SWG easier.

Your comment about hardcore players only wanting games to be hardcore for the purpose of "boasting" shows that far from being a review of Vanguard this is simply a player who wants to play a very casualcentric game attacking those who want a more challenging game.

Not an objective review and to be taken with a pinch of salt.

[Eldahir]

I disagree almost everything in that review. If you can call it a proper review, done by undoubtably low level character on the very day the MMORPG hits stores, when they are pretty much without exception buggy and non-polished.

I think you should go play some other MMOG.

And next time you do a review, try not to generalize your own views to look like they would be others views like the thing on death penalties. You are only talking for yourself there.

[Varel]

Nice review, long and in-depth.

I also concurr with your 6.5 score...but not neccessarily due to the same reasons as yourself.

The only gripe i would have is the constant comparison to WoW, and yes, you reasoned that out at the beggining, so that's really just a personal issue.


Hehe....however, an average review here will meet you with nothing but contempt from the harcove VG crew. Seeing as this is their forum.

Good effort.

[trinix]

Nice review, long and in-depth.

I also concurr with your 6.5 score...but not neccessarily due to the same reasons as yourself.

The only gripe i would have is the constant comparison to WoW, and yes, you reasoned that out at the beggining, so that's really just a personal issue.


Hehe....however, an average review here will meet you with nothing but contempt from the harcove VG crew. Seeing as this is their forum.

Good effort.

Nothing to do with fanboi vs hater. It's just that while he feels these problems are going to break the game, we feel like these problems aren't problems but features to expand the world.

If you want to go from 1 side of America to the other, you have a few options. You can choose for the fast plane, the train, the bus, drive in a car yourself. But when you get into a bus and start complaining to the man driving he's not going as fast as the plane, you can say he's right. But then again, didn't you know before going with the bus, he's not going to fly?

When I get into a bus I expect something, if that is delivered it's fine. I'm not going to complain to the driver that he's not flying, because I don't think a bus can fly.

[DocSavag]

The review is well written and even correct in some places but the lead up to how we got here has some problems. The first is the over use of the term "hard core" when Sigil uses the term "core" over and over in all of their comments and FAQs.

Its true that their vision adapted over the development but I'm sure thats true of any development.

As for SWG being hardcore. Well there were times it was and times it wasn't. It started with Corpse runs and item decay with a decay system that had items being totally destroyed by bad repair attempt rolls. It could be VERY hard core in that aspect early on. That changed fairly rapidly (I always suspected the corpse runs disappeared due to technical issues with them rather than design issues but no one ever confirmed that)

It is true that after WoW the designers were desparately trying to find a way to increase their market share and did so at the expense of the niche market they had created leaving only the hardcore SW fans. It is still the best game I"ve played for roleplaying because of the way the game engine works.

I think the 6.5 might be low..I'd give it a 7 probably with the potential to be a lot better. It doesn't get demerits for not living up to some niche hardcore fantasy it gets them for being a little rough around the edges and unfinished. Despite that the fun factor is there for those who are interested in finding it and not just "beating it"

[elikal]

The review is well written and even correct in some places but the lead up to how we got here has some problems. The first is the over use of the term "hard core" when Sigil uses the term "core" over and over in all of their comments and FAQs.

Its true that their vision adapted over the development but I'm sure thats true of any development.

As for SWG being hardcore. Well there were times it was and times it wasn't. It started with Corpse runs and item decay with a decay system that had items being totally destroyed by bad repair attempt rolls. It could be VERY hard core in that aspect early on. That changed fairly rapidly (I always suspected the corpse runs disappeared due to technical issues with them rather than design issues but no one ever confirmed that)

It is true that after WoW the designers were desparately trying to find a way to increase their market share and did so at the expense of the niche market they had created leaving only the hardcore SW fans. It is still the best game I"ve played for roleplaying because of the way the game engine works.

I think the 6.5 might be low..I'd give it a 7 probably with the potential to be a lot better. It doesn't get demerits for not living up to some niche hardcore fantasy it gets them for being a little rough around the edges and unfinished. Despite that the fun factor is there for those who are interested in finding it and not just "beating it"


Number and reviews are always highly subjective. How much does something bug you is never objective, and any writer who claims so is wrong. It is my analysis based on my experience. I am really the last to fight over numbers. I have the several parts the numbers I felt right and calculated the average. It may be 70% or 72%, thats not the issue. It IS a great game in many aspects but bogged down by a lot of incoherencies. That is what I see. I am no hateboi, since I play the game. But I SEE and express my doubts and hope they will be polished soon. Reviewers do not have such great power anyway. 90% of all customers of games buy from looking at the game box, as a scientific research has shown about a year ago, at least here in Europe. They have never read reviews nor forums, so we are both sides a VERY tiny and exclusive part of the customers anyways. ;)

[DocSavag]

Number and reviews are always highly subjective. How much does something bug you is never objective, and any writer who claims so is wrong. It is my analysis based on my experience. I am really the last to fight over numbers. I have the several parts the numbers I felt right and calculated the average. It may be 70% or 72%, thats not the issue. It IS a great game in many aspects but bogged down by a lot of incoherencies. That is what I see. I am no hateboi, since I play the game. But I SEE and express my doubts and hope they will be polished soon. Reviewers do not have such great power anyway. 90% of all customers of games buy from looking at the game box, as a scientific research has shown about a year ago, at least here in Europe. They have never read reviews nor forums, so we are both sides a VERY tiny and exclusive part of the customers anyways. ;)

Its interesting to me that of all the comments in my particular response you chose to only talk about the slight quibble I have with the rating. Obviously the difference between 7 and 6.5 isn't significant enough to question your review. I actually found your final analysis pertty dead on. I dispute your findings of fact in the beginning about the target audience of this game though I do accept that the hardcore EQ1 gamer THINKS this game was supposed to be for them. I have my doubts if it was ever really going to be what they want it to be.

[Jacosta]

Vanguard – A sort of review


by Elikal

Reviewing Vanguard (VG) honestly is like cutting off the head of a hydra: Just when you think you’re done, two new heads of peril pop up. The game has so many aspects and angles, it is quite a chore to explain someone Vanguard who has not yet played it. Vanguard – Saga of Heroes was a saga in it’s making in the truest meaning of the word, and most likely will remain so. One can not understand Vanguard fully, without digging a bit into it’s making.

Vanguard was designed by the folks of Sigil, who once left Sony (SOE) and the Everquest team to pursue their own “vision”. But, as ever so often with visions, it must stand against reality, and sometimes the reality check is a painful thing. Vanguard is essentially a game with great potential, and never has this phrase been truer. VG chief developer Brad McQuaid himself, in a sure to be appreciated move of honesty, admitted that the game was released about half a year too early, because they got out of funds. Now we have seen many solo RPGs rushed in the last years, and it is easy to see a premature launch can cause great damage to an otherwise good game. Whether or not this is the case for VG remains to be seen, but chances are about 50/50 for failure or success.

Vanguard has been in planning and making for about five years. Back then, a lot of players had Everquest I and Ultima Online as gamers background, and still recalled this time as their golden era of MMO gaming. But times have changed, and so has the average target audience of gaming. Back in EQ1 days MMOs were filled entirely by students and pupils; that was the niche of gaming. You just can't fill MMOs with them now. Back then we had DOS and Windows 3.1. People were USED to make many things by themselves, but we have 2007 and, well, computers and games have changed. I know, if life is easygoing school or student life, it may be hard to imagine that some have that 40+ hours week, coming home after fighting your boss and your colleagues, you just don’t want to die 20 times with corpse runs, because you already have a hardcore LIFE. That is what VG claimed to reanimate, largely supported by the quite aggressive vocal expression of the VG developers. The way they talked about VG as a hardcore game has attracted a vocal and aggressive minority of players, who hold the “old days” of gaming in their hearts as the best era and condemn all modernization that happened since then in gaming; people who find journals or ingame maps as a feature for weaklings and carebears.

Now we see that you have an agenda to thoroughly trash the game.

The game that changed everything

Then World of Warcraft happened. The debates about how to judge this game have not ended after all the years, but definitely by the sheer number of discussions you can safely say it hit the MMO world like a comet. After WoW EVERYTHING about what a MMO could be was forever changed and re-defined. One of the developers of WoW, when asked what was their recipe for making such a successful game, he said: we checked all features and asked ourselves "is this fun to do?", and if the answer is No, its out. Not realism, not logic, only is it fun! Now you may like or hate the result, but when the day is over, all that counts in the end is: are the shareholders happy or not? And 8 million players surely made Blizzard stockholders quite happy. So asking, what makes the average gamer happy is likely on the top agenda here - or it should be, if the game does not want to vanish like Dark and Light or RF Online. Vanguard was an expensive development, is HAS to pay off big time, like it or not. It obviously took Sigil a lot of time to realize, that their “vision” did just not have the power to make their stockholders as happy as they could be, but the prestige had been set in stone: VG is a hardcore game. It took them a long time, as the painful beta 3 NDA breaches showed, to make VG from a hardcore chore of the “vision” to a game with a realistic degree of accessibility for any normal gamer. This is the core problem which plagues VG now. It has still a lot of reminiscences to the old hardcore “vision” and the demands of the market reality. And that is the one true reason VG is far behind schedule and has spent the money, forcing them now to publish a totally unfinished product.

Now we come to the why you hate the game and why you're trashing it. The breaches of the NDA are standard for any closed beta test by children who cannot be bound to ethical and moral behavior. The game has improved a lot since beta 1 through beta 5. The patch notes bear this out while it's funny that you're silent on those patch notes. It's also funny that you ignore the patches that were happening almost daily and most of the time twice a day during beta 5.

VG is by and large an unfinished product. Many core features are not implemented at all, like the fellowship, who allows XP sharing, or the caravans, which are supposed to make the vast travel times easier. It is a strange twist that mostly those features are not in the game, who are supposed to make it easier accessible. I have seen my share of MMO launches, but the sheer amount of bugs, not implemented features, not tested quests and not balanced areas really exceeds anything I have ever seen. About one third of the entire world have not been tested in the last beta phase at all, and thus are in the game now totally untested. An average of 30% of all quests have bug stoppers, mobs that will not drop the appropriate loot or kills, which do not count. Now I am aware Sigil has made many patches, each with a long list of changes. But if you examined them from the last days of beta to the present, 90% of changes were class reworking and other secondary changes. The real substantial changes, like bug fixing, always made only a very small part of every patch. And surely we can not expect miracles. Bug fixing IS a lengthy and tiresome process. The cost and time of the last 5% of bugs in software as a rule are as high as the fixes for the other 95%, so it will take a LONG time until a majority of bugs will be eliminated. Strangely a great part of patches contain dozens of arbitrary changes like putting a ranger spell from level 4 to level 10, as if they did not have more important things to do.

I noticed that you've overblown two features and claim that they are in the 'majority'. That's only two features out of a long list of features in the game. You also ignore that many of the areas locked off were either beta tested prior to when you entered beta or reserved for filling of content post launch. It's no surprise that you gave it no consideration. The game is chocked full of content for low to mid level which is absent from your 'review'. Also you claim that class balancing is the last thing to do when in MMOs it is the first and foremost thing to do since it has a very direct impact upon a player's experiences in the game.

The most beautiful world

What is definitely breathtaking and the biggest bonus is the world itself. It is without exaggeration the most beautiful and breathtaking world we have seen, likely in any computer game ever. The three existing continents have so many different, wonderful places, sights and designs, it would be worth the money alone for seeing all the sceneries. Vast cities like Aghram or New Torgonor, are easily the most wonderful cities I have ever seen in 20 years gaming. The dark side however is, they are also easily the most lifeless I have seen. If you enter Qeynos (EQ2) or Stormwind (WoW) or Mos Eisley (SWG), you feel the place is alive. People and critter, womp rats, rabbits or sea gulls fill the place with life. Children pass by and play, people get into an argument, THINGS happen around you to simulate life. Entering the cities of Vanguard is mostly like entering a museum. NPCs are nailed down where they stand and barely animated at all. The further away you get from the starter areas the more lifeless the cities become. People love to gather in the cities of WoW, SWG or EQ2, but I can hardly imagine people will gather in New Torgonor, which feels like a graveyard – however the most beautiful. We can only hope this will change, but with the many other more pressing things at hand it is one of the features we won’t see for a long time.

I find the cities to be functional. At no time in the games you described was the npcs lifelike. They all stood around and did nothing. For all intents and purposes they were pieces of furniture. They get a pass and Vanguard does not is because you have your rose tinted glasses on which blind you to the fact that the very games you mentioned suffer from what you blast Vanguard for.

The 19 classes and 15 races are fun to play and mostly well designed. Animations have greatly improved and now and nice to look. Not breathtaking, but the upper quality in MMO terms. It’s the animations for NPCs, especially in social places, which sorely lack. NPCs stand everywhere like frozen, as if some giant had dropped them out of a box and they had been glued down where they fell. Adding the fact they have all quite similar haircuts and clothing and no voiceovers, it really takes a lot of life out of this game. It is hard to imagine people meet and socialize in any place in this game now. While the world is surely breathtaking, it lacks the kind of focus of places like Goldshire in WoW, where you know people can always meet and greet, basically because everyone can reach it, and it is strategically placed.

See my last comment.

Another novelty is, player starter areas are distributed all over the world. There is not only a difficult and long journey, often impossible for anyone below level 30, if you chose a certain race, the quite complicated faction system forces people who want to form a common guild and want to do quests together to all either chose the same race or forget about grouping together for a VERY long time. I can not make people delusions about levelling here. To gain levels is much slower than in any present title. It takes about the same time as in the nefarious Asian grinder Lineage II. That is not so much of a problem in the first 15 levels, since there are many quests, many of which are interesting and well designed. Sure, you have the usual chore of kill X amount of Z, but many interesting and funny quests also, to spice things up. Quests reveal a decent amount of background lore about the world, but it is not too deep and thrilling. If you start the game in any of the newbie areas, you are more or less tossed into a world and supposed to find your place. It is rather sad to see, how less welcoming the starter areas are in terms of story and character development are. Thinking about the detailed background you are given in EQ2 and it’s starter isle, you feel more like tossed into this world and are supposed to see for yourself where you belong. The feel of an ongoing story arc, which covers the entire world and where you can select your role in, is entirely missing. There is no worldwide story whatsoever; maybe in much later levels, but it is a big missed opportunity, and the meagre intro text window can hardly replace this.

Ahh I got to love someone who never did the diplomacy line of their starting area nor actually read the text from the starter adventuring quest line. The lore is there if you had actually paid attention. Also I find that the distribution of the starting areas to be well thought and logical within the context of the land.

Back to old school

Expect that the overall difficulty is higher as in WoW or EQ2. You need groups much more often, you die much easier and it has the corpse run. If you die and no one is there to resurrect you, you revive at an altar. There you can either summon your belongings by paying a small amount of money, loosing some XP and the gear looses some quality which needs to be repaired OR you reach the place where you died. Naked. No, you have some clothing, but without any gear. If you do this corpse run however your gear is not much damaged and you keep most XP. This is essentially nothing but a timesink, and in can be most tiresome in some dungeons. It is not that hard as it sounds, especially when you have people to help you. But it surely is a totally NO-NO for every person who has work and a normal, grown up schedule. Getting quests with the best XP and the best gear usually leads into difficult dungeons. And they are BIG. So if your group gets wiped, you can easily forget doing the rest of your 2-3 hours evening spare time anything else than sneaking into that dungeon and retrieving your corpse. It takes time, and that is likely a big reason for every casual player not to buy VG. Sure, you CAN summon your belongings, but in any dangerous dungeon you die several times, and since money and loot drop is not really abundant, any such evening can easily turn out more as investment than gain, if you call your corpse a few times. The repair cost are soon much higher than the income from the dungeon run itself. Also taken into account, that many areas are barely tested and need weeks or rather months of balancing. The dungeons in the first 15 levels in the various starter areas are so breathtakingly different in difficulty, there is a LOT of work to do in balancing as well. While you can walk through the Kurashasa starter area blindfolded, the first dungeon around Tanvu can easily kill a full group of the most experienced MMO gamers.

I noticed that you left out the option of binding your items so you don't have to do a corpse run naked. The rest of your paragraph is rendered into meaningless drivel due to your starting point leaves out rather important facts. It also shows off that you have an axe to grind and you're not being unbiased like a reviewer should.

A big problem is also the high respawn rate in many areas, especially dense forests and dungeons. Mobs respawn much faster than any average group is able to remove them. Often I was in a dungeon, and when we just killed the two mobs in front of us, those behind us had already respawned. While my groups were able to proceed, it was a 2 hours silent chore. If you entirely lack the time even to exchange a few word the entire reason to enter a MMO is killed. Group adventuring just lives from small talk and short comments, and in many places it is even impossible to type “go left” until the next mob as already started to attack. Since I love to talk to people and not just silently fight, this is one of the aspects I really disliked the most about VG. Due to the tedious nature this ultra-fast respawn causes, a lot of players rather grind a few levels and then do group quests solo instead of finding groups. It is a strange and ironic thing, since the difficulty initially was designed to encourage grouping. But now it has been raised THAT high, that people rather come back when they are strong and fight it out alone instead of the greater risk going through those places with a group.
One of the really good features is the music. The soundtrack is very good and supports the areas perfectly. It is a pleasure to listen to and it’s that kind of soundtrack you want to have on CD. The ambient sound and sound effects however are sub-standard and a rather crude mix of 1990ies sound files.

You obviously never experienced dungeons like The Arcanium and the blighted spider caves in Veskal's. Those two areas had large numbers of groups fighting for spawns to complete the quests inside the dungeon. This is why the respawn rate is like it is. It's also to avoid having the dungeons turn into a time sink. Of course, that thought never crossed your mind from your 'expert' designer viewpoint.

The User Interface (UI) is to a vast degree a WoW clone, down to every key and command. That is in itself neither bad nor good, but the WoW UI wasn’t really one of the most advanced and in my opinion one of the biggest gripes I had with WoW. It is simple, functional but that’s all. The journal has no option to sort quests by type, region or difficulty. The character has no biography people can read, which tended to be a good way to get in touch with people. The map is the most barren and simplified I have seen. many quests still do not have waypoints, and the directions in the texts often are vague and misleading. Finding your aim can be quite a chore. In this feature, as in so many, the split between the hardcore “vision” and the reality check becomes visible. The original idea was not to implement maps at all. As a result, VG would never have started on more than two servers right away, so they started to make a “compromise” for “casual” players – or what a hardcore guy THINKS is casual. The result is a map, which is far too much for the hardcore players and far too less for the normal players, and that is exactly the misery in which VG is stuck in so many things.

Now we get to the brass tacks on why you're ranting about Vanguard. You claimed that the UI in Vanguard is a direct rip off of WoW's. Sorry Charlie but the WoW UI was a rip off of an old EQ1 custom UI someone did. You also state that the controls are set up identical to WoW's. If you know anything about gaming you would know that WoW stole the controls from Doom and the original first person shooters. Casting spells or using special attacks in WoW corresponded with the change weapon keys of Doom by using 1-10. WASD movement as well as mouse/keyboard was implimented in those first generation first person shooters. WoW is hardly original and in fact stole their very art design from Games Workshop. It's par for the course when it comes to Blizzard. Of course, you do have your head in the sand when it comes to this.

Vanguard could be a really good game, if Sigil would listen less to the vocal minority who – partially only for the teenage fun of boasting – demand always greater difficulty, players for whom only perma-death is hard enough. The downside already has paid: on some servers the community is more aggressive than in any MMO I have seen, and I have played a lot. Some servers are ok, but even there you can hardly play 15 minutes without someone who criticizes some features is instantly yelled down by some “fans” he should “shut up and go play WoW”. I have never seen such an aggressive and immature mix of players as in VG. Sure, they aren’t the majority by far, but they vocally dominate the chat channels in many servers and Sigil has so far only moved against the most gross, personal attacks. I would love to see VG succeed, and I am sure many who play it now feel the same about it. But Sigil has to face the real priorities and the REAL core gamer, not some arbitrary but aggressively vocal minority. It is well advised to reveal the roadmap of the next weeks and months and not to fall into the trap to keep their plans a secret. There are just too many questions about whether something is bugged, too complicated to understand or simply “working as intended” and I doubt many players have the endless patience to wait a year for unknown makes-all-good-patches.

Nice job of personally attacking every person who likes the game as it is. This also reinforces the fact that this is not a review but a rant from a person who likes games on easy mode.

SWG was the last game who equally tried to satisfy traditional “hardcore” gamers and also attract new players with much less tolerance to tedium and chore. The NGE, trying to create such a compromise, was the greatest disaster the MMO world has seen to date. The end of the story is, I see another crew of idealistic developers with “visions” and “dreams”, lacking the down to earth pragmatism and the courage to accept the logic of the market. It is the unavoidable logic of capitalism, the only stable and foolproof prophecy - despite Mr. McQuaid's claim there were no prophets - and that it the success of greed. Greed lies in numbers, and as a matter of fact the number of hardcore fans is *quite* anti-proportional to the loudness of their voice. When WOW was launched the definition of what a MMO is has changed forever. SWG has ruined itself trying to be both hardcory and still adapting WOW-elements. Every attempt to make niches within niches, making games too inaccessible will doom any MMO to a miniature niche in mid terms. Not all WOW did was perfect, not all must be 100% done as in WOW to succeed, but the core idea has set an entirely new standard: shortest possible non-fun-times until the fun starts. That is the only winning formula that has a future now. "The avalanche has already started; it is too late for the pebbles to vote."

SWG wasn't hardcore and the ability to afk macro your way through all the professions shows that it wasn't hardcore. You wouldn't know a hardcore game if it came and bit you on the butt. EQ1, UO, and the Islands of Kesmai were very hardcore. Although EQ1 and UO lacked permadeath which Islands of Kesmai did not.

Conclusion

Graphics: The world is breathtaking, however the civilization does not feel alive but more like a painted stage, therefore no maximum value. Some textures and places at not up to the high standard. 7/10

Your point about it not being alive but a stage is readily disproven by the look of the game itself.

Sound: Great music but no voiceover and quite outdated sound effects. 7/10

Voice overs aren't all that cracked up to be since if implemented wrong the voices actually detract from the game due to campiness. The sound effects are quite nice since how many times can you make fire sound different from the first 1 million times you've heard in real life and in a game?

Difficulty: Many modern features are missing. Features which Sigil had planned to make the “challenge” bearable like Fellowships or Caravans are not implemented at all. There is a great imbalance in the various starter areas in terms of difficulty. Also some classes are much easier to play then others. The complicated faction system and the lack of any fast travel options force people to group only with those playing the same race for a long time. 4/10

Two out of all the features in the game do not make a majority. Also classes are designed around certain playstyles. The classes you played obviously show that the ones you think are too easy are the ones that coincide with your preferred lifestyle. Also under a ratings scale of 1-10 the rating should be much higher since those two features you 'claim' to be the majority would push the score up. A 4 on a 1-10 scale means that the game has about as much difficulty as a game of Go Fish!

Fun Factor: The quests are mindful and interesting. Many are quite beyond the usual kill X of Y. Crafting and Diplomacy add some fun things to do, even though they seem to lack the focus at the moment. Since both need a long time to delve in, they do not play a central role besides a bit fun gaming for a few days right now. Some quests are really entertaining and thoughtfully designed. 8/10

Every game ever made in the MMORPG format has used kill x and return to me. In fact, your beloved WoW has solely this type of quest. Also your comparison with crafting and diplomacy to adventuring is far off base since all three spheres need equal time to delve into.

Character Customization: It almost equals the great character customization of SWG. You really have a lot of sliders to create your own character. However, the races tend to look a bit cloned, since there are no textures and no aging slider. Also extreme deformations have been taken out prior to launch, so no fat or extreme thin characters can be made anymore. Since at this moment there are only 4 haircuts for each race, this is not fully implemented as it is supposed. Since hair is a big feature to really look different, the potential is highly cut. 6/10

Once again you ignore what the developers have said in what will be implemented in the first and second patch post launch. This destroys your score.

Reviewer’s Tilt: I am split how to judge the game. It has the potential to be a real hit, but Sigil must get to the grip fast! Nowadays players do not have the years of patience people had back in the SWG era, waiting for years for promises and unspoken “somethings we are adding at some time”. There are awesome things in this game, especially if you seek for a richer and deeper world, but much work needs to be done and if you play Vanguard, be sure to have thick hide and good nerves. For the majority I can only advise to wait half a year. 7/10

Overall: 6.5

My comments are in red.

[Chae668]

obviously this is not the game for you.

this game was designed for mostly all those reasons you dont like.

but, you knew this before you bought the game, and still you post this "review".

my 2 cents

[Faite]

My comments are in red.

No, he just may be in the majority, many of us stay quiet. Remember that.

[Jacosta]

No, he just may be in the majority, many of us stay quiet. Remember that.

Would you care to point out where I claimed I represented the majority in my comments? ;)

[Vithar]

No, he just may be in the majority, many of us stay quiet. Remember that.


lol what does that mean? that the majority of the playerbase actually hates this game but keep on palying? come on now.

No offense but Elk's posts clearly shows he doesnt like this game. Why not move on and play something else instead of trying to turn this game into something HE wants.

[Chae668]

No, he just may be in the majority, many of us stay quiet. Remember that.

what was the point of your comment? perhaps you should stick with keeping quiet.

[Cromulent-UK]

No, he just may be in the majority, many of us stay quiet. Remember that.

How did you come to the assumption that YOU are in the majority? What are you basing that on?

Who are these "many of us" you speak of? Your guild? Your friends? The bloke in the game store? That does not count as the majority in my book, that is a small group of people who share an opinion.

I do not know which opinion is the majority opinion within the Vanguard community is, and I have never claimed to know. What I do know though is that everyone I have talked too is enjoying the game and the challenge it provides (including the frustrating bits).

[skiddaw]

Hi,

I think it was a very honest and well written review. Vanguard does appear to have been released in a buggy and unfinished state, and there isn't much excuse for that.
Jacosta you imply the reviewer was totally biased in his post; "It also shows off that you have an axe to grind and you're not being unbiased like a reviewer should", yet you seem to ridicule every single plausible argument he suggests. It seems that you are the one who is being more biased in favour of the game.
I'm looking forward to vanguard, I really am. I just can't get over the fact that there are loads of people here who can't take criticism, and feel offended when people mention slight problems with the game.

[Jacosta]

Hi,

I think it was a very honest and well written review. Vanguard does appear to have been released in a buggy and unfinished state, and there isn't much excuse for that.
Jacosta you imply the reviewer was totally biased in his post; "It also shows off that you have an axe to grind and you're not being unbiased like a reviewer should", yet you seem to ridicule every single plausible argument he suggests. It seems that you are the one who is being more biased in favour of the game.
I'm looking forward to vanguard, I really am. I just can't get over the fact that there are loads of people here who can't take criticism, and feel offended when people mention slight problems with the game.

Would you be so kind as to point out where I stated in my critique of his rant that I liked the game or that I'm biased towards it?

[Kates]

Graphics: The world is breathtaking, however the civilization does not feel alive but more like a painted stage, therefore no maximum value. Some textures and places at not up to the high standard. 7/10


This is by far the most beautiful world period. I think it is very alive and vibrant. With all the movement in the environment (trees/grass) this is by far the least "painted" world. What would make the cities more vibrant? More useless NPCS?

Sound: Great music but no voiceover and quite outdated sound effects. 7/10

Voice-overs get old quick. They are cool for the first week or so, but get annoying as hell and you end up turning them off.

Difficulty: Many modern features are missing. Features which Sigil had planned to make the “challenge” bearable like Fellowships or Caravans are not implemented at all. There is a great imbalance in the various starter areas in terms of difficulty. Also some classes are much easier to play then others. The complicated faction system and the lack of any fast travel options force people to group only with those playing the same race for a long time. 4/10

Fun Factor: The quests are mindful and interesting. Many are quite beyond the usual kill X of Y. Crafting and Diplomacy add some fun things to do, even though they seem to lack the focus at the moment. Since both need a long time to delve in, they do not play a central role besides a bit fun gaming for a few days right now. Some quests are really entertaining and thoughtfully designed. 8/10


At level 15, I've grouped with probably every race on the continent of Thestra. I really don't see the argument there. Do you want to group with every single race by level 10? Complicated faction system? It seems pretty straight forward to me. You just need to put a little time in to understand it. Crafting and Diplomacy not playing a central role? I think this is where you don't really understand this game. I have friends who LOVE to craft - this is their primary sphere X 50. It is much more than "just a bit of fun" As for imbalanced starter areas - I've played them all - they are all easy. Therefore, if they are imbalanced - one is just a higher scale of easy than another. I don't see an issue here. Classes easier to play than others? Welcome to MMO's. Name one game where the learning curve on each class is identical.

Character Customization: It almost equals the great character customization of SWG. You really have a lot of sliders to create your own character. However, the races tend to look a bit cloned, since there are no textures and no aging slider. Also extreme deformations have been taken out prior to launch, so no fat or extreme thin characters can be made anymore. Since at this moment there are only 4 haircuts for each race, this is not fully implemented as it is supposed. Since hair is a big feature to really look different, the potential is highly cut. 6/10


Deformed characters were never a good thing. I agree more hair styles are needed. Character models could be improved.

Reviewer’s Tilt: I am split how to judge the game. It has the potential to be a real hit, but Sigil must get to the grip fast! Nowadays players do not have the years of patience people had back in the SWG era, waiting for years for promises and unspoken “somethings we are adding at some time”. There are awesome things in this game, especially if you seek for a richer and deeper world, but much work needs to be done and if you play Vanguard, be sure to have thick hide and good nerves. For the majority I can only advise to wait half a year. 7/10

Overall: 6.5

I disagree. The game is extremely fun now. If you can get past the fact that the 15 dollars you will pay a month doesn't buy you a seat on the US Senate - you will have a good time. This is by far the most fun game I've ever played - and this is coming from a WoW-convert. From reading your review, I really feel as though you've missed the big picture. Again. this is just my opinion - it isn't any more important than yours.

[Cromulent-UK]

Hi,

I think it was a very honest and well written review. Vanguard does appear to have been released in a buggy and unfinished state, and there isn't much excuse for that.
Jacosta you imply the reviewer was totally biased in his post; "It also shows off that you have an axe to grind and you're not being unbiased like a reviewer should", yet you seem to ridicule every single plausible argument he suggests. It seems that you are the one who is being more biased in favour of the game.
I'm looking forward to vanguard, I really am. I just can't get over the fact that there are loads of people here who can't take criticism, and feel offended when people mention slight problems with the game.

It is not that people get defensive about the bugs and the problems with the game because there a fair few (even lots of them). It is the fact that the people who usually bash the game are the ones that want to turn it into World of Warcraft or EverQuest 2 which is exactly what, I personally, do not want to see.

I agree with the bugs and problems statements I do NOT agree with the challenge, frustration and faction statements.

[DCpunk]

did anyone point out yet that there ARE voiceovers in the game?

[Pixi]

did anyone point out yet that there ARE voiceovers in the game?

Shhh :D

[trinix]

did anyone point out yet that there ARE voiceovers in the game?

Lol, I never found any, I think. I'll go to town now look for a copy :S. If I get one I can hear the VoiceOvers :).

[Nikkoli]

My comments are in red.

I agree 100%. I was about to post much of the same, then I read your post. The only thing you forgot to add is the fact that there are voice overs on the NPCs, but you actually have to have your sound on to hear it.

[Mcpally]

What Kate said. :D

Can the admins do me a favor and move any and all future posts the OP makes to the Volcano so I can practice not playing well with others?

[Nikkoli]

Hi,

I think it was a very honest and well written review. Vanguard does appear to have been released in a buggy and unfinished state, and there isn't much excuse for that.
Jacosta you imply the reviewer was totally biased in his post; "It also shows off that you have an axe to grind and you're not being unbiased like a reviewer should", yet you seem to ridicule every single plausible argument he suggests. It seems that you are the one who is being more biased in favour of the game.
I'm looking forward to vanguard, I really am. I just can't get over the fact that there are loads of people here who can't take criticism, and feel offended when people mention slight problems with the game.

A reviewer should be unbiased. Someone who is posting their disagreements is not claiming to be posting a review of the game and therefore does not have to be unbiased.

[DCpunk]

Lol, I never found any, I think. I'll go to town now look for a copy :S. If I get one I can hear the VoiceOvers :).

I had to turn my voiceover volume up to hear them. I didn't realize they were in for 2 full days before I found the slider for it in the audio settings menu.

[Mcpally]

Reviewers do not have such great power anyway. 90% of all customers of games buy from looking at the game box, as a scientific research has shown about a year ago, at least here in Europe. They have never read reviews nor forums, so we are both sides a VERY tiny and exclusive part of the customers anyways. ;)

A reviewer should be unbiased. Someone who is posting their disagreements is not claiming to be posting a review of the game and therefore does not have to be unbiased.

Skid the OP not only implys he is a reviewer, but goes on to say he/she/it is in a special exclusive minority group. I quoted his implication for you to make it easier.

[vylo]

One of the developers of WoW, when asked what was their recipe for making such a successful game, he said: we checked all features and asked ourselves "is this fun to do?", and if the answer is No, its out. Not realism, not logic, only is it fun!

Instant gratification is a poor design idea for the long term.

Is not having an exp penalty fun? Yes. Is it it enabling every mental reject under the sun the ability to hit 60 and ruin your groups to the point where you refuse to let anyone outside your guild group with you? No.

Also there is a problem with this. If that was their only criteria, everyone would have teleports to any major location. Travel isn't fun. It is endearing the first time, but quickly gets annoying. There are ways to curb the displeaure, such as the griffons, boats, mounts, and filling in areas with interesting content, but on the whole travel still is an inconvenience, something that I think Vanguard will run into not too long after release.

Despite their hardline adversion to quick travel, I don't think it will take long for significant pressure to mount on them. I have no doubt that VG will have more difficult travel then most if not all other games, but seriously doubt it will remain in its current state.

[elikal]

I had to turn my voiceover volume up to hear them. I didn't realize they were in for 2 full days before I found the slider for it in the audio settings menu.

NPCs say things like "Welcome stranger!" and "Take care on your journey." What I regard as voiceover is that he actually speaks what you otherwise have to read. It was one of the most prominent features EQ2 had from start on a majority of NPCs. I didnt have to read them and regard those voice snipplets as a step back.

Oh and to the "low" graphics, much IS great, but some things are NOT like a 10 would justfity. See screenshot. By the walking sound that brown plastic was supposed to be sand, oh and that red flat thing was some liquid. That is balanced setting.

I did NOT condemn the game. I like a lot of things but also find justified reason to point my finger on many things which are not working atm or simply not there. I think the problem is, game magazines overrate and overhype games in the last years. Did it ever make you wonder why nearly all games of big game companies in the last years were rated 70% and more? You really think they deserved it? Well I dont. I think games like Oblivion or NWN2 were good in in NO way those 95% rating most mags gave them. I think reviews should show the problems the average player faces. No less.

[sudanger]

Port for Plat!!!

Well other than that. The reviewer has some points. And the vanboys proofed again to be worse than any wow fanboy ever can be. Doesn't make me wonder the paragraph about the "fanatics" is nowhere mentioned :)

[Jacosta]

Skid the OP not only implys he is a reviewer, but goes on to say he/she/it is in a special exclusive minority group. I quoted his implication for you to make it easier.

Nik was only defending me and the attack of me being biased due to my comments to the OP. Have you noticed that the person who made the attack has failed to show where I am biased towards the game in my review of the OP's rant?

NPCs say things like "Welcome stranger!" and "Take care on your journey." What I regard as voiceover is that he actually speaks what you otherwise have to read. It was one of the most prominent features EQ2 had from start on a majority of NPCs. I didnt have to read them and regard those voice snipplets as a step back.

Here let us a do a test shall we? I want you to listen to an audio file of just someone saying Welcome over and over again. I challenge you to listen to it 300 times straight before you rip off your ears and jam a pencil into your ear drums.

[Mithrull]

Now we get to the brass tacks on why you're ranting about Vanguard. You claimed that the UI in Vanguard is a direct rip off of WoW's. Sorry Charlie but the WoW UI was a rip off of an old EQ1 custom UI someone did. You also state that the controls are set up identical to WoW's. If you know anything about gaming you would know that WoW stole the controls from Doom and the original first person shooters. Casting spells or using special attacks in WoW corresponded with the change weapon keys of Doom by using 1-10. WASD movement as well as mouse/keyboard was implimented in those first generation first person shooters. WoW is hardly original and in fact stole their very art design from Games Workshop. It's par for the course when it comes to Blizzard. Of course, you do have your head in the sand when it comes to this.

If you go up and down the command list, VG's is more similar to EQ's than anything. It becomes obvious which players have played WoW but not EQ when they talk about "stealing" command keys.

[Jacosta]

If you go up and down the command list, VG's is more similar to EQ's than anything. It becomes obvious which players have played WoW but not EQ when they talk about "stealing" command keys.

Depends on if you're talking about socials or combat. If it's socials then it comes from EQ1, but if it's combat it comes from the first person shooters.

[DocSavag]

I had to turn my voiceover volume up to hear them. I didn't realize they were in for 2 full days before I found the slider for it in the audio settings menu.

I never hear them on my set up either but I hear them constantly from my wife's computer behind me when we are gaming together so they are there. I don't care enough about hearing them to fiddle with the sounds to find them.

[skeeby]

lol ur review was funny...


"Difficulty: This game is hard! 4/10!!!!"

lmao

[sudanger]

If you go up and down the command list, VG's is more similar to EQ's than anything. It becomes obvious which players have played WoW but not EQ when they talk about "stealing" command keys.



Stealing a command layout huh? As we had million sof options with our 128+ keyboards, two hands and ten fingers. I wonder when the first come up with Vanguards Mouse Button layout Mouse1 and Mouse2 was stolen from horizons!!!

[Jacosta]

Stealing a command layout huh? As we had million sof options with our 128+ keyboards, two hands and ten fingers. I wonder when the first come up with Vanguards Mouse Button layout Mouse1 and Mouse2 was stolen from horizons!!!

Lies!! It was John "I AM GOD" Carmack in Doom. Your heresy shall be expunged as the holy emperor of man devours your soul! Ooooppppsss wrong game....

[sudanger]

If you go up and down the command list, VG's is more similar to EQ's than anything. It becomes obvious which players have played WoW but not EQ when they talk about "stealing" command keys.

Lies!! It was John "I AM GOD" Carmack in Doom. Your heresy shall be expunged as the holy emperor of man devours your soul! Ooooppppsss wrong game....

Doom had mouselook? i honestly can't remember. thought quake was the first with "real" 360°mouslook and doom only had up and down. or was it duke nukem maybe....definitly not wolfenstein :rolleyes:

[Mcpally]

Nik was only defending me and the attack of me being biased due to my comments to the OP. Have you noticed that the person who made the attack has failed to show where I am biased towards the game in my review of the OP's rant.

I caught that, but was just pointing out to Skid that the OP claimed it was a review. Personally Ive felt the OP has done nothing but bash VG in every post he/she/it has made in the last two days. Its hard to take an MMORPG reviewer seriously when thier only experience is admittedly WoW, Diablo, and SWG.

[skiddaw]

"Nik was only defending me and the attack of me being biased due to my comments to the OP. Have you noticed that the person who made the attack has failed to show where I am biased towards the game in my review of the OP's rant?"

Man I wasn't making an attack, I was just defending someone who I thought had spent a lot of time making a fair, honest review.

[Jacosta]

"Nik was only defending me and the attack of me being biased due to my comments to the OP. Have you noticed that the person who made the attack has failed to show where I am biased towards the game in my review of the OP's rant?"

Man I wasn't making an attack, I was just defending someone who I thought had spent a lot of time making a fair, honest review.

As I pointed out his review was far from being a fair and honest review.

[Jacosta]

I caught that, but was just pointing out to Skid that the OP claimed it was a review. Personally Ive felt the OP has done nothing but bash VG in every post he/she/it has made in the last two days. Its hard to take an MMORPG reviewer seriously when thier only experience is admittedly WoW, Diablo, and SWG.

Very true and that is the basis for my reply. My experience extends back to the pre-dawn days of internet gaming with such games as Air Warrior I, Multi-player Battletech: Solaris, and Aliens Online.

[TommiL]

i didnt read the review nor have i played the game yet but i can tell you this, its waaaay to early to do a review about an mmo thats just been released its not fair to anyone!

[DCpunk]

NPCs say things like "Welcome stranger!" and "Take care on your journey." What I regard as voiceover is that he actually speaks what you otherwise have to read. It was one of the most prominent features EQ2 had from start on a majority of NPCs. I didnt have to read them and regard those voice snipplets as a step back.

Oh and to the "low" graphics, much IS great, but some things are NOT like a 10 would justfity. See screenshot. By the walking sound that brown plastic was supposed to be sand, oh and that red flat thing was some liquid. That is balanced setting.

I did NOT condemn the game. I like a lot of things but also find justified reason to point my finger on many things which are not working atm or simply not there. I think the problem is, game magazines overrate and overhype games in the last years. Did it ever make you wonder why nearly all games of big game companies in the last years were rated 70% and more? You really think they deserved it? Well I dont. I think games like Oblivion or NWN2 were good in in NO way those 95% rating most mags gave them. I think reviews should show the problems the average player faces. No less.

However, there ARE voiceovers in the game. Saying there are not is disingenuous at best.

Also, I have a pretty crappy machine and my graphics look way, way better than that at an average of about 20fps at 1680x1050.

[bottleneck]

Quote:
"Its hard to take an MMORPG reviewer seriously when thier only experience is admittedly WoW, Diablo, and SWG."


But the whole clue here is that a lot(!) of *players* will have only that experience. Your implications seems to be that noone should be entitled to comment the game unless they have 20 years of mmo experience.

OP: "This is my impression" (but phrased as "this is how it is")
Mobb: "Your impression is wrong" (but phrased as "you suck")

So maybe it's wrong, but I still think the review is very indicative of how many new payers will feel trying the game for the first time.

( /logs off forum to play vg)

[Jacosta]

Doom had mouselook? i honestly can't remember. thought quake was the first with "real" 360°mouslook and doom only had up and down. or was it duke nukem maybe....definitly not wolfenstein :rolleyes:

/cries It was Bethesda Softworks in Terminator: Future Shock was the first to use mouselook. The horror of it all.

[Mcpally]

Quote:
"Its hard to take an MMORPG reviewer seriously when thier only experience is admittedly WoW, Diablo, and SWG."


But the whole clue here is that a lot(!) of *players* will have only that experience. Your implications seems to be that noone should be entitled to comment the game unless they have 20 years of mmo experience.

OP: "This is my impression" (but phrased as "this is how it is")
Mobb: "Your impression is wrong" (but phrased as "you suck")

So maybe it's wrong, but I still think the review is very indicative of how many new payers will feel trying the game for the first time.

( /logs off forum to play vg)

Sorry Bottle, didnt mean to imply you needed more experience as in years or time. Was pointing out the type of games the OP has played as experience. WoW is cartoonish and very easy. SWG has had more than its fair share of issues. Diablo wasnt even an MMO. Its a single person game that you could instance online with a few other people. Was more stating or trying to state that games like EQ1, DAoC, UO, etc would be the opposite of what the OP has experience thus far and enable him/her/it to have a better perspective of what the first generation was like so that he/she/it would be in a more informed position to give such a review. Limited experience meant lack of seeing all sides not years played.

You do have a very valid point in that we will see alot of people that are going to be fairly green to the MMORPG. I hadnt really put much thought into that yet. Like Jacosta, I wasnt saying he sucks, just that he is extremely biased and his/her/it's playing experience will dictate that. Not his/her/it's fault, not everyone can say they are in thier 30's and have been playing RPG's for 20 years. Thus making the review not actually a review but a bias rant. But eh, I love argueing symantics.

[cleatus]

My Review of the OP's Review: 45%

The "review" was poorly thought out. I'm not a Vanguard apologist by any means - most of my posts on the beta boards and beyond are critical in nature. But the OP's review, while certainly better written, has the conceptual and logical accuracy as the other post on these forums asking for vulmane werewolves, city wide buffs a la WoW (although these are in VG), and shapeshifters (although these are also in VG). It's half-baked.

The crux of the OP's argument is that if certain things are not like WoW, especially difficulty-wise, then they are wrong. As has been pointed out, this game was never supposed to be a WoW clone, and if it has borrowed a few things from that game in order to provide a better "bridge" for former WoW players (a good thing), at heart it is still fundamentally different. Just because WoW has succeeded financially does not mean everyone else needs to follow its fundamentals, in order to be successful. That is a complete logical, historical, and economic fallacy. If this were true, we would be stuck in a world like that Sylvester Stallone movie in which every restaurant is Taco Bell. Thankfully, this is still not yet the case. I enjoyed playing WoW, and so far I enjoy this game too, for much different reasons. The rationale behind the OP's review is as accurate as if I went and portentously reviewed WoW on its opening day and wrote a review called "My Review: 50%", basing my criteria on the fact that it wasn't similar enough to its successful predecessor, EQ1. Games succeed and fail on their own merits.

In truth, Vanguard is not a difficult game per se. It is nowhere near as difficult and "frustrating" as "first-gen" games such as EQ1 or UO. It's just not as quick and easy as WoW and EQ2 and was never meant to be. It's a slightly slower paced game in a larger, more complex world that is currently a little short on the bells and whistles. They've looked for their own balance and "feel" that ultimately is nothing like the games that came before it. Is it so hard for the OP (and some others) to believe that many of us simply have more "fun" on almost all levels in games like this compared to WoW? Apparently it is, hence the not-so-veiled insults in his "review."

And that is why the "review" fails as such. I can judge and appreciate WoW on its own merits, but the OP simply cannot do the same with Vanguard.

The OP seems to want a game with WoW mechanics but different visuals. That is totally fine of course; we all like different things. But this game will never be that (nor should it try to be that - it is way too late to shift gears like that now), and that is a very, very good thing for the majority of the people who bought this game for what it has always held itself out to be. People have different definitions of "fun."

I think the OP would like the upcoming Lord of the Rings Online, coming out relatively soon. It is, by all measures, a game based almost entirely on WoW mechanics and the WoW measure of "fun", but with different visuals and lore. Choice is a good thing. But to judge a game for something it was never meant to be, after a few levels of play, with a purely narrow-minded opinion based only on personal desires and previous games, is not a review. It's just a rant.

[Bregalad]

This review has 0 relevance to me. Trying to judge a "to-span-seven-years" MMO on the launch date morning is like making an in-depth review of a new model car after seeing it speed past you on the highway.

Buggy? Released too early? I was able to log in, create characters I wanted, and play a couple of them for a few hours. I did not have to wait in any sort of line, I did not get server crashes, and I completed a whole bunch of quests and such, without encountering a single bug. My 4+ year old PC ran the game just fine after a few settings tweaks. This is head and shoulders better than anything I've seen on launch date of other MMOs.
And I fully expect the game to be carefully monitored and every aspect of it tuned.

Interface? Every single aspect of it is customizable. Every key can be remapped, every control moved to a more convenient position. And given that a lot of people who just plunged into Vanguard, have until recently been playing WoW, isn't it nice for Sigil to give those players an interface they are familiar with? Soon enough, VGinterface will be brimming with all sorts of UI skins. And yeah, WoW interface is nothing original. They simply trolled UI sites of other MMOs and hand-picked the most popular items.

What is WoW? It is a game targeted at the mainstream, at a player for whom it is but a fad, who is not willing to become dedicated. It has hardware requirements to match, it is very accessible, it is easy. Sort of like Tetris with Dwarves and Elves. In what it aimed for, WoW has indeed succeeded admirably. One great thing that WoW has done is it greatly expanded the potential MMO audience, providing a much more fertile ground for Vanguard to thrive on. However, WoW has also attracted the casual consumer. A consumer that might have tried MMOs previously or might not, and concluded that 'MMOs are for geeks, not for me'. Then along comes WoW, claiming 'MMOs ARE for you!!! Just try me and see!'. Consumer tries it, likes it - for that is what WoW has aimed at - and establishes WoW as industry standard, a measuring stick for everything henceforth. And then, every MMO that comes along, the casual consumer will try, and as is case with VSoH, will note with dismay: This MMO is bad because I do not enjoy it. It demands too much of me! The answer: no, this MMO is simply not for you. It is not aiming at 8 million subs. This is a more in-depth product for a more dedicated gamer. 'NOT' hardcore, mind you. A casual consumer often cannot begin to comprehend what a 'hardcore' is.

To summarize: at the top of this thread, I see a review by a casual consumer, annoyed at a 'not for him' product. It does have relevance however - for another casual consumer. If you have read it, agreed with its points, and did not think the review was premature or biased, chances are Vanguard WILL remain a 6.5 for you.

[Moob]

Vanguard could be a really good game, if Sigil would listen less to the vocal minority who – partially only for the teenage fun of boasting – demand always greater difficulty, players for whom only perma-death is hard enough.
So because I prefer a higher difficulty it's highly likely that I'm a teenager or have teenager-like preferences? Sensationalism and generalization detract greatly from your credibility.

I fully support the criticism of this game because it provides an impetus and direction for improvement. Blanket, amorphous criticism does quite the opposite.

[NIladaiya]

I love the community here I swear. You closed minded types make me laugh so hard while at work Its better than any TV sitcom. The OP gave a decent review and as reviews go are simply opinion. But you people vanbois whatever take this crap so seriously its great comedy. Even my coworkers reading over my shoulder laugh at you. Thanks to you vocal minority this game will fail. Not because of the devs, shortcomings, or bugs but you the militant poster child. But please keep it up for my daily shot of humor in the mornings and before lunch.

[Jacosta]

I love the community here I swear. You closed minded types make me laugh so hard while at work Its better than any TV sitcom. The OP gave a decent review and as reviews go are simply opinion. But you people vanbois whatever take this crap so seriously its great comedy. Even my coworkers reading over my shoulder laugh at you. Thanks to you vocal minority this game will fail. Not because of the devs, shortcomings, or bugs but you the militant poster child. But please keep it up for my daily shot of humor in the mornings and before lunch.

Pot meet kettle....

[OdwinOddball]

I love the community here I swear. You closed minded types make me laugh so hard while at work Its better than any TV sitcom. The OP gave a decent review and as reviews go are simply opinion. But you people vanbois whatever take this crap so seriously its great comedy. Even my coworkers reading over my shoulder laugh at you. Thanks to you vocal minority this game will fail. Not because of the devs, shortcomings, or bugs but you the militant poster child. But please keep it up for my daily shot of humor in the mornings and before lunch.

What i find more amusing, is that even while criticizing the OP for his posts, the replies have remained for the most part civil, and while at times quite strict, have not devolved into insults and taunts.

Yet the supporters of the OP, and frankly the OP as well, start off with arrogance and insults, and just get worse as folks disagree with them.

That really shows more about the two views than anything else.

[Faite]

This is by far the most beautiful world period. I think it is very alive and vibrant. With all the movement in the environment (trees/grass) this is by far the least "painted" world. What would make the cities more vibrant? More useless NPCS?

Voice-overs get old quick. They are cool for the first week or so, but get annoying as hell and you end up turning them off.


At level 15, I've grouped with probably every race on the continent of Thestra. I really don't see the argument there. Do you want to group with every single race by level 10? Complicated faction system? It seems pretty straight forward to me. You just need to put a little time in to understand it. Crafting and Diplomacy not playing a central role? I think this is where you don't really understand this game. I have friends who LOVE to craft - this is their primary sphere X 50. It is much more than "just a bit of fun" As for imbalanced starter areas - I've played them all - they are all easy. Therefore, if they are imbalanced - one is just a higher scale of easy than another. I don't see an issue here. Classes easier to play than others? Welcome to MMO's. Name one game where the learning curve on each class is identical.


Deformed characters were never a good thing. I agree more hair styles are needed. Character models could be improved.


I disagree. The game is extremely fun now. If you can get past the fact that the 15 dollars you will pay a month doesn't buy you a seat on the US Senate - you will have a good time. This is by far the most fun game I've ever played - and this is coming from a WoW-convert. From reading your review, I really feel as though you've missed the big picture. Again. this is just my opinion - it isn't any more important than yours.

For you Van boi's and girls who say that WOW is all about 'instant gratification' , no you are wrong.

Vanguard you get a mount when? Level 10. In World of Warcraft, when do you get a mount?
Yea, I thought so...level 40...quite a big difference there in 'instant' gratification huh?

As to difficulty, I played Vanguard in beta and now, and hardly is it any more difficult than World of Warcraft, it is simply more group centric.

As to World of Warcraft players being children, what do you all take in the morning to give you these delusions? I know doctors, lawyers, people who work for Cisco and more that play World of Warcraft, going to wager most of them have more brains than some here.

As to Vanguard, its NOT finished. When it is finished then it might be able to hold a candle and then some to some of the other games on the market, as it stands however, it is not even close.

I don't love WOW, I don't hate Vanguard, I am just sick of the blithering idiots around here who say WOW is all about instant this and instant that when its such a freaking crock of bs. It takes hours and hours and hours of grinding to get anything in WOW and they ONLY just changed some of that and I for one am VERY happy with the direction Blizzard is taking their game.

More towards fun, less towards grind and spending 9 hours a shot in the game.

But as to instant gratification, as to mounts, I think you got the two games mixed up, Vanguard gives you a mount MUCH sooner :)

As to world feel, it still feels empty to me, take the opinion or leave it, the world does not feel alive.

Maybe some of us just have a different version of what constitutes a world feeling alive.

[Jacosta]

For you Van boi's and girls who say that WOW is all about 'instant gratification' , no you are wrong.

Vanguard you get a mount when? Level 10. In World of Warcraft, when do you get a mount?
Yea, I thought so...level 40...quite a big difference there in 'instant' gratification huh?

As to difficulty, I played Vanguard in beta and now, and hardly is it any more difficult than World of Warcraft, it is simply more group centric.

As to World of Warcraft players being children, what do you all take in the morning to give you these delusions? I know doctors, lawyers, people who work for Cisco and more that play World of Warcraft, going to wager most of them have more brains than some here.

As to Vanguard, its NOT finished. When it is finished then it might be able to hold a candle and then some to some of the other games on the market, as it stands however, it is not even close.

I don't love WOW, I don't hate Vanguard, I am just sick of the blithering idiots around here who say WOW is all about instant this and instant that when its such a freaking crock of bs. It takes hours and hours and hours of grinding to get anything in WOW and they ONLY just changed some of that and I for one am VERY happy with the direction Blizzard is taking their game.

More towards fun, less towards grind and spending 9 hours a shot in the game.

But as to instant gratification, as to mounts, I think you got the two games mixed up, Vanguard gives you a mount MUCH sooner :)

Show me one MMO that is finished. By finished that there are no need for expansions or patches. Go ahead and show me since I'm from the Show Me state.

[cleatus]

I love the community here I swear. You closed minded types make me laugh so hard while at work Its better than any TV sitcom. The OP gave a decent review and as reviews go are simply opinion. But you people vanbois whatever take this crap so seriously its great comedy. Even my coworkers reading over my shoulder laugh at you. Thanks to you vocal minority this game will fail. Not because of the devs, shortcomings, or bugs but you the militant poster child. But please keep it up for my daily shot of humor in the mornings and before lunch.

No, thank *you!* I just had some colleagues and clients in my office (it is lunchtime here at my law firm) and we were having a nice chuckle at your post which so gleefully forecasts failure for a multi-year, multi-million dollar project because of a few posters on a message board. It's the gift that keeps on giving!

Back on topic - I definitely agree with Moob. Criticism is vital and important. A "why this game should be like WoW" rant isn't.

[Sensational]

For you Van boi's and girls who say that WOW is all about 'instant gratification' , no you are wrong.

:)
I'm going to have to agree on that point and i can't even begin to see where people are coming from when they say that, WoW is ALL about long term farming of repetitive instances for month after month so that you can get to the next instance and repeat the process there, TBC makes this a little less painfull because you no longer need to get together with 40 people, half of whom you really dislike, to raid day after day.

As for the maturity level of WoW, i'm sure it's possible to find mature people but it sure as hell takes some time to do just that. The majority of WoW players seem to play for themselves and themselves alone, it's all me me me, my purple, my DKP etc.

[Faite]

I'm going to have to agree on that point and i can't even begin to see where people are coming from when they say that, WoW is ALL about long term farming of repetitive instances for month after month so that you can get to the next instance and repeat the process there, TBC makes this a little less painfull because you no longer need to get together with 40 people, half of whom you really dislike, to raid day after day.

As for the maturity level of WoW, i'm sure it's possible to find mature people but it sure as hell takes some time to do just that. The majority of WoW players seem to play for themselves and themselves alone, it's all me me me, my purple, my DKP etc.


Moreso on RP or rp pvp servers, regular pvp servers it can be very immature.

(and yes to the loot ho' comment too, and to most of it, Im not in love with WOW just sick of all this crap I read here about it is all)

[Jacosta]

Moreso on RP or rp pvp servers, regular pvp servers it can be very immature.

Are you even going to bother to back up your statement regarding Vanguard being unfinished by answering my question or are you going to stick your head in the sand and ignore it?

[Mcpally]

Are you even going to bother to back up your statement regarding Vanguard being unfinished by answering my question or are you going to stick your head in the sand and ignore it?

Nope, the pot and the kettle are too busy staring at eachother in the ironic amazement that they are they same color.

[Rourke]

I'm just wondering.......WHERE THE HELL DID ALL THESE FRIGGING EBERT AND ROPER CRITICS SPAWN FROM??!!!!! It's like half the MMO world is made up of people that think i want to read their long winded review of game. I swear like 100 people have done this same tired crap. Please stop and go get a job for the New York Times.

It's amusing too.....the people that like the game write things like..." I really like it..VG is great!!"

People that don't like it or can find a flaw in almost anything need to write a frigging novel.

Here's my review.

I like it. I run around and kill things. The graphics are pretty. I craft things. Vanguard is neat and it's new. Yay.:eek:

[Jacosta]

Nope, the pot and the kettle are too busy staring at eachother in the ironic amazement that they are they same color.

I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. :cool:

[Bregalad]

As I pointed out his review was far from being a fair and honest review.
I would like to dispute that. I actually think it was completely honest as it presented the reviewer's position. The OP genuinely dislikes the issues talks about.

Consider a review by a photo amateur who has been using a simple point-and-shoot digital camera, and producing OK pictures. Fancying himself a pro, he decided to splurge on a full-featured digital SLR. Here is his review, in a nutshell:
I cannot understand what the fuss is about. My old camera weighs 4 oz and fits in my shirt pocket. Only buttons I ever needed to use on my old camera are 'power', 'zoom', and 'shutter', and I had great pictures.
This camera is huge, and weighs a ton. It has a lot of strange features that make no sense, and fiddling with them only makes the picture worse. And I can't see much improvement over my old camera anyway. A really lame limitation, is inability to preview the shot using the screen - have to use the viewfinder which has a lot of confusing symbols. This is probably to make the user hold the camera to his face, in a bad attempt to disguise camera's ungainly weight that makes holding it the proper way (about a foot in front of you) all but impossible.

Seems familiar? Honest? From reviewer's standpoint, sure. Fair? To a certain extent. A review like this will definitely appeal to those who primarily value compactness and ease-of-use. But any advanced photographer will no doubt call it a travesty.

With respect to people of similar mindset as the OP, whose preferences resonate with issues presented, I'd say the review is fair. As one progresses into the game, it will only get tougher and more complex.

In short:
to OP and the like: this game is not for you.
to Jacosta and the like: OP's review is not for you. ;)

[Faite]

I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. :cool:

Ah, no Jacosta, but having read some of your other posts in other threads, typing out a response to your silly comment is not even worth it. It would simply serve to feed into your frothing at the mouth vanboi'ism and I just can't do that for ya'. Sorry :rolleyes:

Security with ones statements does not equate to running away.

[Jacosta]

Ah, no Jacosta, but having read some of your other posts in other threads, typing out a response to your silly comment is not even worth it. It would simply serve to feed into your frothing at the mouth vanboi'ism and I just can't do that for ya'. Sorry :rolleyes:

Security with ones statements does not equate to running away.

You mean security in knowing that you've made a stupid comment and got called on it? You made the assertation that Vanguard is the only MMO that is unfinished. I'm requiring to back that assertation up with actual facts by presenting all of us with one MMO that has never needed a single patch or a single expansion.

[Faite]

I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. :cool:

You mean security in knowing that you've made a stupid comment and got called on it? You made the assertation that Vanguard is the only MMO that is unfinished. I'm requiring to back that assertation up with actual facts by presenting all of us with one MMO that has never needed a single patch or a single expansion.

Want to quote where I said it was the only one? K, thanks.

(closed beta tester for wow by the way, no way I would have ever said wow was finished at release lol, no how, no way, what I said was, right now in its current state Vanguard can not hold a candle to the other games on the market (in my opinion, you are not required to agree with me!! See how that works? Called a free mind) )

[Spirit]

The review was ok OP, and although I didn't agree with all of what you said, you made some accurate and fair observations.

The responses have been hilarious however, so I give this thread

9.5

[Jacosta]

Want to quote where I said it was the only one? K, thanks.

(closed beta tester for wow by the way, no way I would have ever said wow was finished at release lol, no how, no way, what I said was, right now in its current state Vanguard can not hold a candle to the other games on the market (in my opinion, you are not required to agree with me!! See how that works? Called a free mind) )

As to Vanguard, its NOT finished. When it is finished then it might be able to hold a candle and then some to some of the other games on the market, as it stands however, it is not even close.

Don't write a check with your mouth that you can't cash. Now answer my question by showing all of us on the forums that one MMO that is completely finished without requiring a single patch or a single expansion. Show me.

[Faite]

Don't write a check with your mouth that you can't cash. Now answer my question by showing all of us on the forums that one MMO that is completely finished without requiring a single patch or a single expansion. Show me.

Again, I did not say its the only one, retard. Sheesh, are you for real?

Where did I say patches would not complete it? lol.

oh my god..you must be 16. (i must be reverting by reading these posts, i actually said retard)

These forums are worse than WOW and MUCH worse than eq2.
At least there you can actually find people who 'read'.

[Mcpally]

The review was ok OP, and although I didn't agree with all of what you said, you made some accurate and fair observations.

The responses have been hilarious however, so I give this thread

9.5

Damn, I was shooting for 9.8!

[elikal]

Thanks for keeping my review up in the forum list.
Everyone serves his role.

[Abelian75]

Don't write a check with your mouth that you can't cash. Now answer my question by showing all of us on the forums that one MMO that is completely finished without requiring a single patch or a single expansion. Show me.

Um, he said to show where he said it was the ONLY one. Which you did not do.

Why are you still around making this ridiculous argument?

[Faite]

Um, he said to show where he said it was the ONLY one. Which you did not do.

Why are you still around making this ridiculous argument?

Thank you Abelian! Though im a she, but THANK YOU. I felt like I might just be bashing my head on a brick wall.

teehee.

[Jacosta]

Again, I did not say its the only one, retard. Sheesh, are you for real?

Where did I say patches would not complete it? lol.

oh my god..you must be 16. (i must be reverting by reading these posts, i actually said retard)

These forums are worse than WOW and MUCH worse than eq2.
At least there you can actually find people who 'read'.

Instead of answering a simple question you insult me. How typical for someone who played WoW and I'm not surprised. Those that can't debate insult and in doing so lose. You were saying something about me being 16 when I have yet to insult you or use vulgar language against you? Looks like the only person being the adult is me since I haven't stooped to your level.

[Rourke]

Don't write a check with your mouth that you can't cash. Now answer my question by showing all of us on the forums that one MMO that is completely finished without requiring a single patch or a single expansion. Show me.

I can..The utter complexity and use of colors here boggle the mind. WoW is king you say?? I think not kind sirs or madams......I am still writing my own personal review on this game. It will be published in a hardcover binded version available for 39.99 at Barnes and Noble soon. I was born to review games.

http://play.toontown.com/about.php

[Jacosta]

Um, he said to show where he said it was the ONLY one. Which you did not do.

Why are you still around making this ridiculous argument?

I'm answering his ridicules argument that Vanguard is unfinished. He needs to back that claim up that there is at least one MMO out there that is completely finished.

[Abelian75]

Thank you Abelian! Though im a she, but THANK YOU. I felt like I might just be bashing my head on a brick wall.

teehee.

Oh, you are, this guy's been around for weeks making this same argument on the vanguard forums. He made a post that basically asked people to give one MMO that was finished upon release, implying that the fact that the answer is "none" somehow means that there's no room for being more or less unfinished. Clearly it is not a matter of a binary state of finished vs. unfinished, and clearly when someone calls a game finished they really mean "more finished than usual," and when someone calls a game unfinished they mean "less finished than usual." He's had it carefully explained to him why what he's saying is flawed, but continues to do so.

[NIladaiya]

Actually Jacosta I am normally a laid back person. However to be honest the volatile nature of the VG forums in general is part of the reason I decided not to play this game. There are other reasons to such as I believe it bores me. And no I dont play nor will ever play WoW. But the community in game chat and out of makes me cringe and fear for humanity that you would take something as trivial as a game and make it something so serious and monumental in you life that you have to bring down someone else to feel gratification. And I made my last post to prove a point. Instead of just moving on and living your life you jumped on it. Which is my point to you all. Instead of leaving the review alone and letting the OP be entitled to his opinion alot of you attacked. Which makes this community be one which most people will not want to be a part of. And you may enjoy your lil castle but if no profit is made then the castle gets repossesed. And instead of attacking then at least have the balls to write your own thoughtful review like the OP and see how that turns out. Thank you for participating in todays exercise in restraint :)

[Faite]

I can..The utter complexity and use of colors here boggle the mind. WoW is king you say?? I think not kind sirs or madams......I am still writing my own personal review on this game. It will be published in a hardcover binded version available for 39.99 at Barnes and Noble soon. I was born to review games.

http://play.toontown.com/about.php

Jacosta, you don't have to call names, you do just fine by trying to humiliate anyone without your opinion (Ive been around since 2004, been watching you on the beta forums too, trust me)

Rourke, noone said WOW is king, read our posts.

And here is my quote, which Jacosta still did not quote as he is too busy bluthering on about odd things:

>>>As to Vanguard, its NOT finished. When it is finished then it might be able to hold a candle and then some to some of the other games on the market, as it stands however, it is not even close.>>>

As it says 'when' it is finished, thus implying it will eventually be nearer than it is now to being finished, and AT that point I said it will hold a candle 'and then some' to the other games around right now.

Only you van boi's could turn that into me bashing Vanguard.

lol.

[Jacosta]

Oh, you are, this guy's been around for weeks making this same argument on the vanguard forums. He made a post that basically asked people to give one MMO that was finished upon release, implying that the fact that the answer is "none" somehow means that there's no room for being more or less unfinished. He's had it carefully explained to him why what he's saying is flawed, but continues to do so.

No, the people making the statements that Vanguard is unfinished is flawed as a basis to attack the game. There hasn't been a single MMO released that is by definition finished. Thus, by requiring them to show proof of a finished MMO it invalidates their position on Vanguard being unfinished. Use logic much?

[Jacosta]

Jacosta, you don't have to call names, you do just fine by trying to humiliate anyone without your opinion (Ive been around since 2004, been watching you on the beta forums too, trust me)

Rourke, noone said WOW is king, read our posts.

And here is my quote, which Jacosta still did not quote as he is too busy bluthering on about odd things:

>>>As to Vanguard, its NOT finished. When it is finished then it might be able to hold a candle and then some to some of the other games on the market, as it stands however, it is not even close.>>>

As it says 'when' it is finished, thus implying it will eventually be nearer than it is now to being finished, and AT that point I said it will hold a candle 'and then some' to the other games around right now.

Only you van boi's could turn that into me bashing Vanguard.

lol.

I removed your unfinished card and destroyed that statement for you to bash the game. If you feel humiliated for me pointing out your flawed argument that is on you.

[Abelian75]

No, the people making the statements that Vanguard is unfinished is flawed as a basis to attack the game.

Which is fine. When they say unfinished, it can be reasonably assumed they aren't making the claim that other games are completely and utterly finished and never need patches. A reasonable reader would assume they mean significantly less finished than other games. And that is a perfectly good reason to criticize a game.

I mean, seriously, if you actually were to say that your argument was anything other than sophism, you'd have to say that a game can be released in any state at all. That's obviously ridiculous.

And yes, I do indeed use logic much and am very good at this stuff.

[Faite]

I'm answering his ridicules argument that Vanguard is unfinished. He needs to back that claim up that there is at least one MMO out there that is completely finished.

/bangs head on wall some more.

Ok Jacosta, first of all, I never said other games 'at release' were more finished (though Id have to say some were), I also never said Vanguard would never reach that state of proverbial 'being finished'. However in its current state Vanguard is lacking polish. Noone says they won't gain the polish and go on to be a succesful, wonderful game. I never said that in fact I said once it was finished it just might outdo some of the other games around right now.

Its just that as it stands at this moment in time, "I" (not you or anyone else, just me) "feel' (feelings, those are something you do without requiring others to agree) that "Vanguard' is not finished enough to warrant charging people to play it.

I love many things about the game and have stated such in many posts on the Vanguard beta forums under my old screen name of rastaah. I have also though, watched you under the same name of Jacosta bash and humliliate anyone with an opinion other than yours.

So I apologize if finally I am just giving you back some of your very own medicine by calling you a retard, which by the way, I have to say, was an insult to people who are retarded because I should not use their unfortunate state to describe you. You are just plain thick.

[Jacosta]

Which is fine. When they say unfinished, it can be reasonably assumed they aren't making the claim that other games are completely and utterly finished and never need patches. A reasonable reader would assume they mean significantly less finished that other games. And that is a perfectly good reason to criticize a game.

No it's not since they are twisting the definition of finished from the objective to their subjective viewpoint. If they want to criticize the game go for it, but don't twist words to make a point. It only makes you look stupid. Unfinished by definition means not completed. When is an MMO ever completed?

[WallaWalla]

bah..lets reword the statement to something like "Vanguard is in a state lacking of some of the promised features and has a large amount of bugs to fix. Other MMORPGS on the market have more of there promised features and less bugs and thus will be more likely to have a greater market share."

[Faite]

No it's not since they are twisting the definition of finished from the objective to their subjective viewpoint. If they want to criticize the game go for it, but don't twist words to make a point. It only makes you look stupid. Unfinished by definition means not completed. When is an MMO ever completed?

learn to read Jacosta, truly go back and polish up on reading comprehension, please. You need to start reading and taking in peoples opinions instead of blindly rushing forth , your sword brandished to slay all that oppose the mighty Vanguard.

While cute in a sense that you are all that loyal, its really annoying to those of us who get accused of stupid crap by you.

[Jacosta]

/bangs head on wall some more.

Ok Jacosta, first of all, I never said other games 'at release' were more finished (though Id have to say some were), I also never said Vanguard would never reach that state of proverbial 'being finished'. However in its current state Vanguard is lacking polish. Noone says they won't gain the polish and go on to be a succesful, wonderful game. I never said that in fact I said once it was finished it just might outdo some of the other games around right now.

Its just that as it stands at this moment in time, "I" (not you or anyone else, just me) "feel' (feelings, those are something you do without requiring others to agree) that "Vanguard' is not finished enough to warrant charging people to play it.

I love many things about the game and have stated such in many posts on the Vanguard beta forums under my old screen name of rastaah. I have also though, watched you under the same name of Jacosta bash and humliliate anyone with an opinion other than yours.

So I apologize if finally I am just giving you back some of your very own medicine by calling you a retard, which by the way, I have to say, was an insult to people who are retarded because I should not use their unfortunate state to describe you. You are just plain thick.

Only goes to show you that you can't debate nor hold a civil discourse. I have never once called anyone names nor have I ever humiliated them. I only called them on their statements and illogical positions.

[perfect]

No, the people making the statements that Vanguard is unfinished is flawed as a basis to attack the game. There hasn't been a single MMO released that is by definition finished. Thus, by requiring them to show proof of a finished MMO it invalidates their position on Vanguard being unfinished. Use logic much?

It's not finished! I tried to attack the game last night and lost. It's like fighting a red6 solo.

Logic goes great with cheese.

[Abelian75]

No it's not since they are twisting the definition of finished from the objective to their subjective viewpoint. If they want to criticize the game go for it, but don't twist words to make a point. It only makes you look stupid. Unfinished by definition means not completed. When is an MMO ever completed?

Yeah, it's subjective to an extent. You can pretty much call anything other than mathematics subjective if you want to. But who cares? If someone logs in and plays the game and gets the impression that it is unfinished, then that is important. One wants to avoid giving that impression when one releases a game.

[Jacosta]

bah..lets reword the statement to something like "Vanguard is in a state lacking of some of the promised features and has a large amount of bugs to fix. Other MMORPGS on the market have more of there promised features and less bugs and thus will be more likely to have a greater market share."

That would be a logical and accurate statement.

[Isobel]

Oh, you are, this guy's been around for weeks making this same argument on the vanguard forums. He made a post that basically asked people to give one MMO that was finished upon release, implying that the fact that the answer is "none" somehow means that there's no room for being more or less unfinished. He's had it carefully explained to him why what he's saying is flawed, but continues to do so.

To get back to the original topic quickly. Some of the OP's points were valid. However, the OP has spent the past few days complaining that the game is too hard. Asking that the difficulty of dungeons be lowered and spawn rates be made slower or spawn rates to be made faster because he doesn't want to wait. The reason that many of the respondants to this post have been so dismissive of his point of view is, that they fear that this game will go the way of SWG and EQ2. Complaint after complaint asking that things be made easier.
"I want to be a Jedi at character creation.", "Crafting is too time consuming and hard! Make it easier."

What the OP and many others fail to realize is that this game was designed and marketd by and for those gamers who want a real challenge.

[Rourke]

Rourke, noone said WOW is king, read our posts.



Another joke gone bad. /sigh. I was injecting humor into your silly little forum fight. People express thier opinions too much too often i think. I don't much care who likes it or doesn't. It's a game. It's new. I just find all this arguing over the small details wrecks the community and it's frigging boring. Just play it and shut up. Found a big bug? Report it and move on. Don't like the game? Stop playing. End of story.

I had the unfortunate experience today of having to listen to a Game Stop employee tell why the game sucked after he Beta 3 tested it and why he loves WoW. I just stared at him until he moved his geeky little ass outta my way. That's right...i'm a jerk.

[Abelian75]

Only goes to show you that you can't debate nor hold a civil discourse. I have never once called anyone names nor have I ever humiliated them. I only called them on their statements and illogical positions.

You routinely try to mangle people's words instead of giving any kind of reasonable reading. You will make any kind of argument in order to confuse and obfuscate the issue. I actually find that extremely insulting and disrespectful.

[Jacosta]

learn to read Jacosta, truly go back and polish up on reading comprehension, please. You need to start reading and taking in peoples opinions instead of blindly rushing forth , your sword brandished to slay all that oppose the mighty Vanguard.

While cute in a sense that you are all that loyal, its really annoying to those of us who get accused of stupid crap by you.

Did you not say that Vanguard is unfinished? You did so my reading comprehension is just fine, so that would mean that you should take grammar lessons on how to use words properly and in context.

[WallaWalla]

To get back to the original topic quickly. Some of the OP's points were valid. However, the OP has spent the past few days complaining that the game is too hard. Asking that the difficulty of dungeons be lowered and spawn rates be made slower or spawn rates to be made faster because he doesn't want to wait. The reason that many of the respondants to this post have been so dismissive of his point of view is, that they fear that this game will go the way of SWG and EQ2. Complaint after complaint asking that things be made easier.
"I want to be a Jedi at character creation.", "Crafting is too time consuming and hard! Make it easier."

What the OP and many others fail to realize is that this game was designed and marketd by and for those gamers who want a real challenge.

You never know what you had until it gets taken away

[Jacosta]

You routinely try to mangle people's words instead of giving any kind of reasonable reading. You will make any kind of argument in order to confuse and obfuscate the issue. I actually find that extremely insulting and disrespectful.

I have not mangled anyone's words. He said that Vanguard was unfinished did he not? Those are his words not mine nor did I twist his words to say that Vanguard was unfinished. Talk about needing reading comprehension.

[perfect]

...I was injecting humor into your silly little forum fight....

It's humour, Rourke. Geez.

As for your intent, well, two can play at that game.

[Faite]

Did you not say that Vanguard is unfinished? You did so my reading comprehension is just fine, so that would mean that you should take grammar lessons on how to use words properly and in context.

Like I said, you are and have been doing this since beta, you twist what people say around to suit your own version of what you think they said.

Try law school.

[Rourke]

I posted this on another thread...but this is what video game whiners remind me of.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfQ3i_lZEgQ

[Abelian75]

Did you not say that Vanguard is unfinished?

Which is, again, fine, as I have explained. There is nothing in that statement that requires that there exist other games that are completely and utterly finished upon release.

[WallaWalla]

I have not mangled anyone's words. He said that Vanguard was unfinished did he not? Those are his words not mine nor did I twist his words to say that Vanguard was unfinished. Talk about needing reading comprehension.

Well he does have a point about it being unfinished...no MMORPGS are truly finished except those that have stopped (and even some of those are built more by users)

[Abelian75]

I have not mangled anyone's words. He said that Vanguard was unfinished did he not? Those are his words not mine nor did I twist his words to say that Vanguard was unfinished. Talk about needing reading comprehension.

That is indeed what he said. What you did was twist the words to imply that other games are all completely finished. Since this is something any reasonably intelligent person should realize is silly, I can only assume you are willfully trying to confuse the issue with false logic, which is not something I respect.

[Jacosta]

Well he does have a point about it being unfinished...no MMORPGS are truly finished

As such under that criteria he cannot use it to attack Vanguard due to all MMO's are unfinished.

[Faite]

Which is, again, fine, as I have explained. There is nothing in that statement that requires that there exist other games that are completely and utterly finished upon release.

right, exactly and in fact I later stated that I closed beta tested WOW and that upon release most of us felt there were bugs etc that could be fixed more and better. I know eq2 had a similar release.

I also know, by being at the Sony Block party last summer than Vanguard was going to release at a time that complimented TBC coming out, a rep for Vanguard told me this.

I am pretty sure even back then they knew it was coming out around now.

Anyway, I was not even bashing them for releasing it early was just saying, its really a good game just very unfinished. Relative to what? Who knows.

But yes, I do feel its too rough to release, however I do not feel it will not improve and grown and become great with time. (much like a pearl)

(been mmorpg'ing since 1996, no way I don't understand they are never finished....heck, the game I started in back then (dragonrealms) is still not finished, that was not my point and I think deep inside Jacosta knows this was NOT my point)

[Abelian75]

As such under that criteria he cannot use it to attack Vanguard due to all MMO's are unfinished.

Again, no, because some may be more unfinished than others.

[rikestard]

Nothing to do with fanboi vs hater. It's just that while he feels these problems are going to break the game, we feel like these problems aren't problems but features to expand the world.

If you want to go from 1 side of America to the other, you have a few options. You can choose for the fast plane, the train, the bus, drive in a car yourself. But when you get into a bus and start complaining to the man driving he's not going as fast as the plane, you can say he's right. But then again, didn't you know before going with the bus, he's not going to fly?

When I get into a bus I expect something, if that is delivered it's fine. I'm not going to complain to the driver that he's not flying, because I don't think a bus can fly.



goood analagy

[Jacosta]

That is indeed what he said. What you did was twist the words to imply that other games are all completely finished. Since this is something any reasonably intelligent person should realize is silly, I can only assume you are willfully trying to confuse the issue with false logic, which is not something I respect.

No, he said that it was unfinished which implies that somewhere out in the world there is a finished MMO. Logic states that there must be an opposite to everything. Under said logic then there must be a finished MMO out there. Also under a logical fallacy I first must present his position wrongly and misusing a person's stance. I didn't and attacked his position head on with what he said.

[Faite]

goood analagy

I should have added that I do not want Vanguard dumbed down whatsoever.

That was NOT my point.

[Jacosta]

Again, no, because some may be more unfinished than others.

There are no degrees of being incomplete. Either they are incomplete or they are complete. It is black and white with zero shades of grey.

[Faite]

No, he said that it was unfinished which implies that somewhere out in the world there is a finished MMO. Logic states that there must be an opposite to everything. Under said logic then there must be a finished MMO out there. Also under a logical fallacy I first must present his position wrongly and misusing a person's stance. I didn't and attacked his position head on with what he said.

STOP CALLING ME A HE. And, you wonder why I called you thick and lacking in comprehension?

[perfect]

...But yes, I do feel its too rough to release, however I do not feel it will not improve and grown and become great with time. (much like a pearl)

I disagree. To compare it to a pearl is like saying that Vanguard stinks like something that lives underwater. Are you just trying another angle to attack the game?

If anything, Vanguard is like a diamond that keeps growing and getting better over time. A magical diamond.

<pout> Now I want a magical diamond.

[Kolorean]

I want to lend my opinion to this fun thread. The review itself is very well written, a good read, and touched upon a lot of points. I agree with about 1/2 of things written, which isn't bad. Everyone has opinions, and a review is one person's opinion.

As to VSOH itself, I think a release review would have to be backed up with another written 3,6,9 months and a year down the road. As I remember, EQ1 and EQ2 were both sparse on release, had bugs, problems..what ever. The point is, personally, I believe in the Dev team, and the patching, improvements, fixes, content added that will be coming down the road.

Vanguard character classes, and races, and start over all experience is great. I think it's a strong suit of the game. I don't want to be led around, treated like a child, shown everything..I want to explore, quest, figure things out on my own. I want corpse runs (adds a lot of risk/reward to the game) I want to rush to mobs for raids like the old days of EQ1. I don't want to level to max in a month, it takes away from the game and sure makes it hard to log in other than raid.

Yes VSOH has some problems, bugs, but so far, I like the harder core feel. I play 4-5 hours a night 6 nights a week, hardly a "hard core" gamer, but I will make it, just a little longer than the hardcore folks.

8.75 score so far.

[Jacosta]

STOP CALLING ME A HE. And, you wonder why I called you thick and lacking in comprehension?

I called you a he because I didn't know your gender. Did that ever cross your mind? I'm not a mind reader able to see all across the globe to find out a person's gender. Would you rather I called you an it until I found out what gender you are?

[WallaWalla]

No, he said that it was unfinished which implies that somewhere out in the world there is a finished MMO. Logic states that there must be an opposite to everything. Under said logic then there must be a finished MMO out there. Also under a logical fallacy I first must present his position wrongly and misusing a person's stance. I didn't and attacked his position head on with what he said.

Now judging from what he was implying...it was NOT that there were finished MMOs it was that there are MMOs out there more finished from vanguard. Using your knowledge of MMOs you should logicly be able to figure that out. What you are doing now IS twisting words.

[Faite]

I disagree. To compare it to a pearl is like saying that Vanguard stinks like something that lives underwater. Are you just trying another angle to attack the game?

If anything, Vanguard is like a diamond that keeps growing and getting better over time. A magical diamond.

<pout> Now I want a magical diamond.

How about a magical pearly diamond.

[WallaWalla]

How about a magical pearly diamond.

OOO! gimme gimme!

[Abelian75]

No, he said that it was unfinished which implies that somewhere out in the world there is a finished MMO. Logic states that there must be an opposite to everything. Under said logic then there must be a finished MMO out there. Also under a logical fallacy I first must present his position wrongly and misusing a person's stance. I didn't and attacked his position head on with what he said.

An opposite to everything, sure, I guess, but it doesn't have to actually exist. One can imagine a perfectly complete game, even if it's an ideal that will never be obtained. There's no such thing as a perfect person either, but it still makes sense to talk about people being extremly flawed, and that doesn't magically imply that a perfect person exists somewhere.

This is a ridciulous discussion though, the kind of thing one gets tired of seeing in a philosophy class. We're having this intense logical debate over an OBVIOUS truth: That calling a game very unfinished is obviously a reasonable statement that applies more or less readily to various games.

[perfect]

...Yes VSOH has some problems, bugs, but so far, I like the harder core feel. I play 4-5 hours a night 6 nights a week, hardly a "hard core" gamer, but I will make it, just a little longer than the hardcore folks.

8.75 score so far.

That's hardcore to me. :)

I was thinking around 8/10, which (purely my opinion and you can't have it!) is better than the 5-7s out there now.

[Jacosta]

Now judging from what he was implying...it was NOT that there were finished MMOs it was that there are MMOs out there more finished from vanguard. Using your knowledge of MMOs you should logicly be able to figure that out. What you are doing now IS twisting words.

If she was trying to say that the game lacks certain functionality I would agree, but she didn't. She said that the game was unfinished which means that there must be a game that is finished by her standards.

[perfect]

OOO! gimme gimme!

No fair!

Are there two?

[Isobel]

That's hardcore to me. :)

I was thinking around 8/10, which (purely my opinion and you can't have it!) is better than the 5-7s out there now.

It's a very subjective label. Generally hardore means plays more than me and casual means plays less than me.

[Abelian75]

There are no degrees of being incomplete. Either they are incomplete or they are complete. It is black and white with zero shades of grey.

Sure, one could make that argument. Or you could not make that argument and try for a second to understand what meaning of "incomplete" the author is clearly using, realize that they are in fact talking about degrees of incompleteness, realize that that does indeed apply to things in the real world, and go from there.

[Jacosta]

An opposite to everything, sure, I guess, but it doesn't have to actually exist. One can imagine a perfectly complete game, even if it's an ideal that will never be obtained. There's no such thing as a perfect person either, but it still makes sense to talk about people being extremly flawed, and that doesn't magically imply that a perfect person exists somewhere.

This is a ridciulous discussion though, the kind of thing one gets tired of seeing in a philosophy class. We're having this intense logical debate over an OBVIOUS truth: That calling a game very unfinished is obviously a reasonable statement that applies more or less readily to various games.

And I want you to back up your statement by providing us all with a very complete game. That is a perfectly reasonable request.

[Abelian75]

If she was trying to say that the game lacks certain functionality I would agree, but she didn't. She said that the game was unfinished which means that there must be a game that is finished by her standards.

Why? Again, I can call someone flawed and not know anyone perfect.

[WallaWalla]

It bugs me when people become stubborn when they start to lose an argument (this is called human psychology) anyway back to the original topic

[Jacosta]

Sure, one could make that argument. Or you could not make that argument and try for a second to understand what meaning of "incomplete" the author is clearly using, realize that they are in fact talking about degrees of incompleteness, realize that that does indeed apply to things in the real world, and go from there.

The argument has been made and using the definition of the word she used I counterpointed.

not complete; lacking some part.

Now show us all a game that isn't lacking something.

[Abelian75]

And I want you to back up your statement by providing us all with a very complete game. That is a perfectly reasonable request.

What? Why? I just explained why one need not, indeed does not, exist.

You're basically in the realm of metaphysics/philosophy of language here. This is getting ridiculous. You are clearly trying to weave as complex a web as possible to make it impossible to have a reasonable discussion. You must be able to see this. Just come down to earth and realize that saying that one feels a game is unfinished is clearly a reasonable statement.

[perfect]

It's a very subjective label. Generally hardore means plays more than me and casual means plays less than me.

Aren't most (if not all) labels subjective? I mean, Jack In The Box (a fast food place) labels their drinks as Cold Drink (I kid you not). Could I use more paranthesi? Parenthesis'es? Whatever. Oops, I fell off topic.

That 'Cold Drink' label is subject to whatever is placed in the container (coffee?) and the outside temp (I'm in Vegas and a 'cold' drink in 110 degree weather isn't cold for long).

The more I think about it, the more I am coming to belive all labels are subjective. You label me, I label you and we are dubbed the People-Posting-On-Boards-Instead-Of-Playing. That's doesn't flow so well.

[Abelian75]

Now show us all a game that isn't lacking something.

There is no need to do this, one does not exist. I have explained this many, many times now.

[perfect]

Why? Again, I can call someone flawed and not know anyone perfect.

Yes?

[Isobel]

You label me, I label you and we are dubbed the People-Posting-On-Boards-Instead-Of-Playing. That's doesn't flow so well.

It may not flow but it's funny.

[WallaWalla]

My review 8/10

Rough around the edges but the gameplay is great.

Classes are all useful and are actually differant from one another.

Diplomacy works!

Good team that fixes bugs...fast...

[Abelian75]

It bugs me when people become stubborn when they start to lose an argument (this is called human psychology) anyway back to the original topic

Make no mistake, there are plenty of humans that don't do this, at least to this extent.

[Jacosta]

What? Why? I just explained why one need not, indeed does not, exist.

You're basically in the realm of metaphysics/philosophy of language here. This is getting ridiculous. You are clearly trying to weave as complex a web as possible to make it impossible to have a reasonable discussion. You must be able to see this. Just come down to earth and realize that saying that one feels a game is unfinished is clearly a reasonable statement.

No, I am in the realm of facts. You made an assertation that you cannot back up, so now you're strawmanning me. The only person that is being unreasonable is you by not backing up your assertation with facts that there is a game out there that doesn't lack any features. Either concede the point that you are in error for a basis to attack the game or don't, but that's up to you.

[AsheMan]

Having played for 50 of the last 72 hours... I'd give Vanguard a solid 9/10!

That's my review! It rocks!

[Abelian75]

Yes?

Crap, so YOU'RE the reason it's not irrational for me to see flaws in people?

I guess someone needs to make a game called "finished" and thus unlock the metaphysical barriers preventing us from having discussions about unfinished aspects of games.

[WallaWalla]

There is no need to do this, one does not exist. I have explained this many, many times now.

Just ignore w/e he says... if he wants to carry on let him... btw im sure he will try to provoke you back into it

[perfect]

It may not flow but it's funny.

Least someone appreciates me.

<looks at Faite>
<looks at Jacosta>
<looks at Abelian75>
<looks at WallaWalla> I just wanna say bing bang.

Love you all.

[Faite]

Sure, one could make that argument. Or you could not make that argument and try for a second to understand what meaning of "incomplete" the author is clearly using, realize that they are in fact talking about degrees of incompleteness, realize that that does indeed apply to things in the real world, and go from there.

lol I must be nuts to keep trying to explain myself but here I go again.

What I said and meant Jacosta, was that the game , to me, (me not you, not Abelian and not Jesus) feels unfinished in a way that makes me unable to really sink my teeth into it.

This is purely my own feeling and opinion and is not to say that any other MMORPG was not released in the same unfinished state, just that in those other games release states , the ones I played I 'could' sink my teeth in and stay interested and play.

I have no doubt this game is going to grow and become better and better and will eventually surpass some of these other games as it has more complexity.

But they need to add in some things such as wandering chatting npc's (again not blanketing and saying there are none, saying there are not enough for me to feel like the world is alive) and more quests in certain areas (again not all areas) and also make it so that things are just more alive in the world around us.

To some its ok to play like that, for me I just get bored, Im a kid at heart and one thing I loved about eq2 was how chock full the world was of talking, arguing, preaching Npc's. I used to giggle as I ran through town hearing them bicker to each other and say 'HEy you, come here! To me. And you would get to know them both in EQ2 and in WOW. There are children in WOW, and in EQ2. Fighting siblings. That kind of thing

In WoW there is much the same thing, magical brooms, wandering groups of npc that chat at each other with a story if you stop, you can hear their story.

Chairs would be nice, maybe they already added them. The bar keeps need to look more animated and maybe just more ambience.

This is just one persons opinion though, maybe an area exists in game like all this and I just missed it?

In any case, for me it feels incomplete, like they forgot to connect the a, b and c's .

Sorry! Its just how I feel.

Maybe its not the game for me, but that would make me sad since Ive been following it since 2004.

And I dont mind any of the game play or any of the facts about it being hard.
I like its challenge and that makes it a perfect compliment to games like WOW

[Abelian75]

No, I am in the realm of facts. You made an assertation that you cannot back up, so now you're strawmanning me. The only person that is being unreasonable is you by not backing up your assertation with facts that there is a game out there that doesn't lack any features. Either concede the point that you are in error for a basis to attack the game or don't, but that's up to you.

I have made no assertion that such a game exists, for the love of god. I have explained why one need not exist.

Explain how I have made a strawman argument. That is, explain your position, then explain how I attacked a different position.

Seriously, are you just a troll? If you are then my god, you're an extremely consistent one. Like, over the course of weeks, maybe months. It's terrifying.

[Rourke]

edit

[perfect]

Crap, so YOU'RE the reason it's not irrational for me to see flaws in people?....

Gosh, I hope not.

Though I have been the cause of much bigger trageties in my lifetime.

[rikestard]

Vanguard – A sort of review


by Elikal

Overall: 6.5



Thanks Elikal this is what i want to read before i buy this game, thanks
and GJ

[Kates]

Hahah. this thread is turning out to be epic. I'm soooo gonna get flamed for this, but this thread reminds me SOOOOOOOO much of the WoW message boards...that it has to be blessed with.....

To all the board warriors above!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!

…………………………………….__,,,,,,,---,,,,,,_…………………………………………………………
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…………,’ ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ,,_
…………| ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;


That made me giggle.

[Rourke]

Just to get back to the OP's post.....

I really think a nice Chai tea is soothing late at night...a little nutmeg..cinnamon...curl up with your loved one....it's Nice.

Also..obviously..the 67' Mustang is far better than a 59' Chevy...well..imo at least. And i don't see how you can say Global Warming is a myth??!! Have you seen the ice shelf melting in Greenland for god's sake?!!! Seriously WTF??!!!

I do hope we find an alternative fuel source soon, but for now i think invading Middle Eastern countries is our best solution to driving gas prices back down. Drilling in Alaska is just wrong!! What about the Bears people??!!

/derail off.

[Abelian75]

Just ignore w/e he says... if he wants to carry on let him... btw im sure he will try to provoke you back into it

I will eventually, I've been at this before with him. I don't pretend that this doesn't indicate that there is something the matter with me. :)

[perfect]

Hahah. this thread is turning out to be epic. I'm soooo gonna get flamed for this, but this thread reminds me SOOOOOOOO much of the WoW message boards...that it has to be blessed with.........

Wait, this isn't the WoW boards? OMG.

[Faite]

Least someone appreciates me.

<looks at Faite>
<looks at Jacosta>
<looks at Abelian75>
<looks at WallaWalla> I just wanna say bing bang.

Love you all.

lol we need more like you around here Perfect. That is one thing noone can argue! (and wallaawlla and abelian, and some others who are rational)

Now have a perfect pearly magical diamond of doom ON the house!

[Jacosta]

I have made no assertion that such a game exists, for the love of god. I have explained why one need not exist.

Explain how I have made a strawman argument. That is, explain your position, then explain how I attacked a different position.

Seriously, are you just a troll? If you are then my god, you're an extremely consistent one. Like, over the course of weeks, maybe months. It's terrifying.

You made the assertation when you said Vanguard was unfinished and proceeded to attack the game. By using your own words logic states that there is a complete and polar opposite which in this case a finished game. I merely asked for you to present this finished game, instead you rant and rave at me while calling me names. Also you used an ad hominem persona logical fallacy.

[Abelian75]

Wait, this isn't the WoW boards? OMG.

Honestly I have never seen anyone like Jacosta on the WoW boards. That isn't to say they aren't pretty much a terrible, miserable place, and in fact thus far these boards, even the old VG boards were (barely) better, but in terms of individuals I think this guy takes the cake.

[perfect]

lol we need more like you around here Perfect. That is one thing noone can argue! (and wallaawlla and abelian, and some others who are rational)

Now have a perfect pearly magical diamond of doom ON the house!

Yeah, um...you really, really don't want more like me around. I broke the mold and anyone else using that mold will be...ah, broken.

Thanks for the Pearl!

[perfect]

Honestly I have never seen anyone like Jacosta on the WoW boards. That isn't to say they aren't pretty much a terrible, miserable place, and in fact thus far these boards, even the old VG boards were (barely) better, but in terms of individuals I think this guy takes the cake.

Cake? Who has cake?

Jacosta! Do you have cake?

[Jacosta]

Cake? Who has cake?

Jacosta! Do you have cake?

I sent you some yesterday. :D

[Jacosta]

Honestly I have never seen anyone like Jacosta on the WoW boards. That isn't to say they aren't pretty much a terrible, miserable place, and in fact thus far these boards, even the old VG boards were (barely) better, but in terms of individuals I think this guy takes the cake.

You mean someone that's civil and completely logical in how they position themselves in a debate?

[Faite]

You made the assertation when you said Vanguard was unfinished and proceeded to attack the game. By using your own words logic states that there is a complete and polar opposite which in this case a finished game. I merely asked for you to present this finished game, instead you rant and rave at me while calling me names. Also you used an ad hominem persona logical fallacy.

Do you even know which of us you are talking to anymore? Myself or Abelian? Or both . lol.

And to whoever said these are like WOW forums, NOT REALLY!!! We need a not really bird.

I can go right now and I doubt I can find this level of silliness on the WOW Forums, maybe some omg wtf r u? but none of this fancy worded silly silly BS crap.

Ok out of curiousity I went to the WOW Forum, here is a thread from the 'general' area

BEGIN THREAD
If you were a girl, would you have sex with illidan? why or why not? Personally, I'm not gay or anything, but if i were a girl I would. i like his attitude. But only if i'm a girl
END THREAD

yea....ok then.....

[Kates]

Cake? Who has cake?

Jacosta! Do you have cake?



Did someone say cake?


I want cake :(


Please give me cake!

[Jacosta]

Do you even know which of us you are talking to anymore? Myself or Abelian? Or both . lol.

And to whoever said these are like WOW forums, NOT REALLY!!! We need a not really bird.

I can go right now and I doubt I can find this level of silliness on the WOW Forums, maybe some omg wtf r u? but none of this fancy worded silly silly BS crap.

I'm an adult trying to have a civil discussion which you seem to be unable to do. If you don't like the fact that I destroyed your point about the game being unfinished then there is the door. Don't let it hit you on the butt on your way out.

[Jacosta]

Did someone say cake?


I want cake :(


Please give me cake!

/mails Kate a homemade cake.

[Abelian75]

You made the assertation when you said Vanguard was unfinished and proceeded to attack the game. By using your own words logic states that there is a complete and polar opposite which in this case a finished game. I merely asked for you to present this finished game, instead you rant and rave at me while calling me names. Also you used an ad hominem persona logical fallacy.

I may insult you in my own way, but that's not a fallacy unless I imply that those insults have some bearing on the argument. I don't, I just think you need to be informed.

I've never attacked Vanguard at all. I haven't even stated my opinion of the game, I'm simply making the argument that it is, in fact, fine to say that a game is unfinished.

I've already explained why logic does not dictate that a complete and poar opposite, a finished game, exists. You have not countered anything I've said in this regard.

Here is the argument:

You say: You cannot call a game unfinished, because there does not exist a finished game.

I say: That is not a valid statement. I can call a person flawed, despite there existing no flawed people in the world.

You say: Show me the finished game. (Note that you have completely ignored what I said).

You are making a strawman argument. I know you like to use that word since it's frequently used against you, but I'm afraid it still applies to you, not me, here. Why? My argument counters the statement that "If Not-A exists, then A must exist," which is, in fact, your argument. YOUR argument counters the statement "This object is Not-A, other objects are A." The latter half of that statement is not being asserted by anyone, which makes your argument a strawman argument.

[Faite]

I'm an adult trying to have a civil discussion which you seem to be unable to do. If you don't like the fact that I destroyed your point about the game being unfinished then there is the door. Don't let it hit you on the butt on your way out.

You destroyed nothing lol.

/points at the WOW forums

you may find people who can relate to you more that a way

[Abelian75]

You mean someone that's civil and completely logical in how they position themselves in a debate?

No, I mean someone that ignores everything being said to them while pretending to be intelligent.

[perfect]

I can go right now and I doubt I can find this level of silliness on the WOW Forums, maybe some omg wtf r u? but none of this fancy worded silly silly BS crap.

Ok out of curiousity I went to the WOW Forum, here is a thread from the 'general' area

BEGIN THREAD
If you were a girl, would you have sex with illidan? why or why not? Personally, I'm not gay or anything, but if i were a girl I would. i like his attitude. But only if i'm a girl
END THREAD

yea....ok then.....

I think she called you 'fancy', Jacosta. Then she said something about being gay.

I was way weirded out when I quoted this cause it wasn't in the original quote. I thought I picked up a PM like someone might get a snippet of a cell conversation. Spooky.

[cleatus]

lol I must be nuts to keep trying to explain myself but here I go again.

What I said and meant Jacosta, was that the game , to me, (me not you, not Abelian and not Jesus) feels unfinished in a way that makes me unable to really sink my teeth into it.

This is purely my own feeling and opinion and is not to say that any other MMORPG was not released in the same unfinished state, just that in those other games release states , the ones I played I 'could' sink my teeth in and stay interested and play.

I have no doubt this game is going to grow and become better and better and will eventually surpass some of these other games as it has more complexity.

But they need to add in some things such as wandering chatting npc's (again not blanketing and saying there are none, saying there are not enough for me to feel like the world is alive) and more quests in certain areas (again not all areas) and also make it so that things are just more alive in the world around us.

To some its ok to play like that, for me I just get bored, Im a kid at heart and one thing I loved about eq2 was how chock full the world was of talking, arguing, preaching Npc's. I used to giggle as I ran through town hearing them bicker to each other and say 'HEy you, come here! To me. And you would get to know them both in EQ2 and in WOW. There are children in WOW, and in EQ2. Fighting siblings. That kind of thing

In WoW there is much the same thing, magical brooms, wandering groups of npc that chat at each other with a story if you stop, you can hear their story.

Chairs would be nice, maybe they already added them. The bar keeps need to look more animated and maybe just more ambience.

This is just one persons opinion though, maybe an area exists in game like all this and I just missed it?

In any case, for me it feels incomplete, like they forgot to connect the a, b and c's .

Sorry! Its just how I feel.

Maybe its not the game for me, but that would make me sad since Ive been following it since 2004.

And I dont mind any of the game play or any of the facts about it being hard.
I like its challenge and that makes it a perfect compliment to games like WOW

I agree with all the stuff you wanted above (well except for the verbosely talking NPC's, but maybe I'm just EQ2-phobic since I despised that game so much). There's no reason why it won't come into the game later, and in fact Brad and other devs have made posts stating a lot more is going to be added (especially visual elements) right after launch. The game isn't done (even by MMO standards), and it's more "unfinished" than most. But even as it is, it's got some great elements that make it more fun than most already, to me.

I can understand why you need it to be more finished before truly sinking your teeth in; I just hope that enough people find the game fun enough currently that this will give the team the financial resources to continue to polish the game and make it fun for the probably sizeable number of people for whom polish is a deciding factor. I think that under the circumstances, the launch has gone better than expected, so I'm cautiously optimistic.

[Faite]

I agree with all the stuff you wanted above (well except for the verbosely talking NPC's, but maybe I'm just EQ2-phobic since I despised that game so much). There's no reason why it won't come into the game later, and in fact Brad and other devs have made posts stating a lot more is going to be added (especially visual elements) right after launch. The game isn't done (even by MMO standards), and it's more "unfinished" than most. But even as it is, it's got some great elements that make it more fun than most already, to me.

I can understand why you need it to be more finished before truly sinking your teeth in; I just hope that enough people find the game fun enough currently that this will give the team the financial resources to continue to polish the game and make it fun for the probably sizeable number of people for whom polish is a deciding factor. I think that under the circumstances, the launch has gone better than expected, so I'm cautiously optimistic.

Ive had it pre ordered since December and cancelled last night and Im obviously still torn or I wouldnt be here, so yea its a good game.

I may go ahead and 'reorder' and join up this week, Im just still as I said in a weird state of mind about Vanguard hehe.

I love it and I hate it at the moment

[Abelian75]

I'm an adult trying to have a civil discussion which you seem to be unable to do. If you don't like the fact that I destroyed your point about the game being unfinished then there is the door. Don't let it hit you on the butt on your way out.

It seems more to me that you're trying to use confusing arguments in order to not simply disagree with someone's opinion of the game, but instead try to prove that their opinion is somehow impossible and incoherent. This would be an interesting tack if your arguments made sense, but they do not and it is obvious upon casual observation that they do not, which makes you insulting.

[Zakonax]

I only read the first page or so, and I am a little disgusted with what I see. The OP in "his" review, from his own point of view, gave it 65%. That's great, it's HIS opinion. I don't understand why there are 17 pages of posts of people arguing about one persons opinion. If it differs to yours, too bad. If it's the same, that's great. At the end of the day, does it really matter? If you are enjoying it, does it matter what the OP thinks of the game?

[Abelian75]

I only read the first page or so, and I am a little disgusted with what I see. The OP in "his" review, from his own point of view, gave it 65%. That's great, it's HIS opinion. I don't understand why there are 17 pages of posts of people arguing about one persons opinion. If it differs to yours, too bad. If it's the same, that's great. At the end of the day, does it really matter? If you are enjoying it, does it matter what the OP thinks of the game?

Well, the reason I'm posting here isn't because I agree or disagree with the OP. It's because someone is not only disagreeing with the OP, but trying to "prove" that they are actually incoherent in their opinion, that feeling that a game is unfinished is somehow not a rational opinion.

[perfect]

...If you are enjoying it, does it matter what the OP thinks of the game?

Yes.

To use a horrible analogy that is completely illogical, a bit of a confabulation, and will be picked apart by the dozens (see, I can do fancy, too):

Bush is enjoying his war. Does it matter what he thinks of it?

[Jacosta]

No, I mean someone that ignores everything being said to them while pretending to be intelligent.

Funny but there you go again insulting me without actually attacking my position. Try harder next time since you have yet to say that you were wrong in your statement that the game is unfinished as a basis to bash the game.

[Quasimojo]

Wow. Lotta posts landing really quick on this one.

To the OP, good effort. The review was well-written. However, it did come off as quite biased. Your opinions and agenda are pretty clear. I just happen to disagree with the majority of it from the standpoint of whether those particular design elements would be good or bad for the game.

[Abelian75]

Bush is enjoying his war. Does it matter what he thinks of it?

True, that does matter. Even worse, though, I hear Bush might issue a statement that he believes Vanguard is unfinished.

Shortly thereafter he will undoubtedly be removed from office on the grounds that someone making such an incoherent statement is clearly not fit to serve as the president.

[Bregalad]

Actually Jacosta I am normally a laid back person. However to be honest the volatile nature of the VG forums in general is part of the reason I decided not to play this game. There are other reasons to such as I believe it bores me. And no I dont play nor will ever play WoW. But the community in game chat and out of makes me cringe and fear for humanity that you would take something as trivial as a game and make it something so serious and monumental in you life that you have to bring down someone else to feel gratification. And I made my last post to prove a point. Instead of just moving on and living your life you jumped on it. Which is my point to you all. Instead of leaving the review alone and letting the OP be entitled to his opinion alot of you attacked. Which makes this community be one which most people will not want to be a part of. And you may enjoy your lil castle but if no profit is made then the castle gets repossesed. And instead of attacking then at least have the balls to write your own thoughtful review like the OP and see how that turns out. Thank you for participating in todays exercise in restraint :)
I will try to give an answer to that. To begin with, a thoughtful review by a player who seeks long-term commitment is impossible this early. One generally can decide he never wants to see that girl again after the first date. The decision to marry usually takes a great deal longer to arrive to.

Now, on to the community. Ever seen a cornered animal? That's us. WoW is breaking records and topping the charts. Game publishing execs are seeing green. Mainstream is in. Build for the masses and watch the millions roll in. Players who have the time and will to dedicate and want something more in-depth only face one frustration after another. EQ2, SWG, Horizons, AC2, DDO, the list goes on - failed to deliver. Games in planning don't look too promising either. MAYBE the game we want is a pipe dream, but Vanguard is the only runner that looks darn close, and is strong enough to gain that critical mass an MMO needs to survive.
Yet with all the other 'diet' MMOs already out and in the making, not a minute seems to pass without some pundit climbing on a soapbox to condemn Vanguard for insufficient catering to mainstream, and predict doom and gloom. Let us grognards have a game we can enjoy and call our own! We believe there is enough od us by now to sustain a full-scale MMO. The community WILL fight tooth and claw.
This will not always be the case, we will mellow out. Brad stated that getting half a mil subs would be enough for him to consider VSoH a success. If the game stays its course, and gains a strong subscription base, the specter of WoW-ization will somewhat dissipate, people will relax. We old farts can be quite congenial when noone is trying to take away our candy.

[Nargroth]

This review, to me, seems to reek of self opinion and a "I want the devs to listen and change it MY way" tone to it.

/thumbsdown

[Abelian75]

Funny but there you go again insulting me without actually attacking my position. Try harder next time since you have yet to say that you were wrong in your statement that the game is unfinished as a basis to bash the game.

Perhaps you could address the big post I wrote about the arguments we've exchanged and that you have yet to respond to mine. The fact that you are not doing this is why you do indeed deserve to be thought less of.

Here is what I want you to respond to, again:

Me: Believing something lacks a quality does not imply that there must exist an object that (fully) has that quality. I can believe a person is flawed without there existing flawless people.

Now, for the love of all that is holy, respond.

Oh, and once again, I have not called the game unfinished. I have no position on the review, I am responding to you and you alone. I have made no comment about vanguard. All I care about is showing why calling a game unfinished is a reasonable statement.

[Jacosta]

I may insult you in my own way, but that's not a fallacy unless I imply that those insults have some bearing on the argument. I don't, I just think you need to be informed.

I've never attacked Vanguard at all. I haven't even stated my opinion of the game, I'm simply making the argument that it is, in fact, fine to say that a game is unfinished.

I've already explained why logic does not dictate that a complete and poar opposite, a finished game, exists. You have not countered anything I've said in this regard.

Here is the argument:

You say: You cannot call a game unfinished, because there does not exist a finished game.

I say: That is not a valid statement. I can call a person flawed, despite there existing no flawed people in the world.

You say: Show me the finished game. (Note that you have completely ignored what I said).

You are making a strawman argument. I know you like to use that word since it's frequently used against you, but I'm afraid it still applies to you, not me, here. Why? My argument counters the statement that "If Not-A exists, then A must exist," which is, in fact, your argument. YOUR argument counters the statement "This object is Not-A, other objects are A." The latter half of that statement is not being asserted by anyone, which makes your argument a strawman argument.

Actually I didn't use a strawman since a strawman completely misrepresents the person's original position. Here's a good exampled for you.

Step 1: Build the Straw Man: "Evolution is false! How could a mouse evolve into an elephant!?"

Step 2: Knock down the Straw Man by any means necessary: "How could a mouse evolve into an elephant? There would have to be billions of changes for that to occur, and nobody has ever seen speciation anyway!"

Step 3: Connect the original position to the Straw Man:"So it's silly...who has ever seen a mouse evolve into an elephant? Nobody!!"

Step 4: Claim to negate the opposing position by the connection in 3. "Therefore, evolution must be false!"

The statement is Vanguard is unfinished and my rebuttal was a direct head on to that statement with show me a game that is finished. Learn what a fallacy is before you throw the word around to make yourself look intelligent.

[cleatus]

Ive had it pre ordered since December and cancelled last night and Im obviously still torn or I wouldnt be here, so yea its a good game.

I may go ahead and 'reorder' and join up this week, Im just still as I said in a weird state of mind about Vanguard hehe.

I love it and I hate it at the moment

I was in that boat a few weeks ago, I think we're on different "steps" of the same line. It's just that weird unfinished, slightly unsolid feeling that the world gives off sometimes, even the NPC voiceovers are still a little off (some of them sound like the actors are talking through mouthfuls of cotton). And the font used for names etc. The ugly huge yellow font is terrible - and deserves its own thread. But right at the end of beta the world really started making sense and its size, beauty, and sheer number of interesting things to do, and the interesting class and races, outweighed the unfinished elements.

[perfect]

True, that does matter. Even worse, though, I hear Bush might issue a statement that he believes Vanguard is unfinished.

Shortly thereafter he will undoubtedly be removed from office on the grounds that someone making such an incoherent statement is clearly not fit to serve as the president.

Whoa, wait, he thinks Vanguard is unfinished? What a tool. It's SO finished.

Next he'll think that throwing money (read: troops) at an issue will fix it. Like the way Sigil will throw money (read: money) at a bug until it goes away.

Vanguard needs a bit of work and is semi-finished. That a word?

[perfect]

...Now, for the love of all that is holy, respond....

I like that movie.

[Jacosta]

Perhaps you could address the big post I wrote about the arguments we've exchanged and that you have yet to respond to mine. The fact that you are not doing this is why you do indeed deserve to be thought less of.

Here is what I want you to respond to, again:

Me: Believing something lacks a quality does not imply that there must exist an object that (fully) has that quality. I can believe a person is flawed without there existing flawless people.

Now, for the love of all that is holy, respond.

Oh, and once again, I have not called the game unfinished. I have no position on the review, I am responding to you and you alone. I have made no comment about vanguard. All I care about is showing why calling a game unfinished is a reasonable statement.

Only after you concede that you made a false statement as a basis to attack the game.

[Blitzburg]

Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 7/10
Difficulty: 4/10
Fun Factor: 8/10
Character Customization: 6/10
Reviewer’s Tilt: 7/10

Great write up. You certainly put some thought into the review, and I applaud that.

That said, why are these the criteria upon which MMOs are judged these days? If you have 6 categories and 3 of them are graphics/sound related, then fully half of the score is based upon non-gameplay related issues. Not knocking you personally, since most reviews are like that these days (and I'm guessing thats why we see so many crappy games rated so highly).

Of the other 3, only "Fun Factor" appears to be a relevant category for me. Why should a game be judged against other games based upon "Difficulty"? Some games are harder, some are easier - i don't see how difficulty makes one game "better" than another though.

If you are going to average the scores, then I think each category should be equally important. So something like:

Graphics/Sound/Etc.
Performance
Fun
Class Balance
Adventuring Gameplay
Crafting + Diplomacy Gameplay
Community

- my 2cp

[Rourke]

Anyone remember this old nugget??!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rw-YA2pmsjc

Soundtrack rocks!!!!

[Faite]

Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 7/10
Difficulty: 4/10
Fun Factor: 8/10
Character Customization: 6/10
Reviewer’s Tilt: 7/10

Great write up. You certainly put some thought into the review, and I applaud that.

That said, why are these the criteria upon which MMOs are judged these days? If you have 6 categories and 3 of them are graphics/sound related, then fully half of the score is based upon non-gameplay related issues. Not knocking you personally, since most reviews are like that these days (and I'm guessing thats why we see so many crappy games rated so highly).

Of the other 3, only "Fun Factor" appears to be a relevant category for me. Why should a game be judged against other games based upon "Difficulty"? Some games are harder, some are easier - i don't see how difficulty makes one game "better" than another though.

If you are going to average the scores, then I think each category should be equally important. So something like:

Graphics/Sound/Etc.
Performance
Fun
Class Balance
Adventuring Gameplay
Crafting + Diplomacy Gameplay
Community

- my 2cp

Graphics/Sound/Etc: 7/10 (for me, this varies Im sure)
Performance: 6/10
Fun: 7/10
Class Balance: 7/10
Aventuring gameplay: 7/10
Diplomacy: 9/10
Crafting: Cant say didnt do it
Community: 3/10 (the 3 representing those who are nice and helpful)

I want to add

uniqueness of play/classes/etc: 9/10
unique new elements, ie boats: 9/10

world feel: 3/10

[cleatus]

Now, on to the community. Ever seen a cornered animal? That's us. WoW is breaking records and topping the charts. Game publishing execs are seeing green. Mainstream is in. Build for the masses and watch the millions roll in. Players who have the time and will to dedicate and want something more in-depth only face one frustration after another. EQ2, SWG, Horizons, AC2, DDO, the list goes on - failed to deliver. Games in planning don't look too promising either. MAYBE the game we want is a pipe dream, but Vanguard is the only runner that looks darn close, and is strong enough to gain that critical mass an MMO needs to survive.
Yet with all the other 'diet' MMOs already out and in the making, not a minute seems to pass without some pundit climbing on a soapbox to condemn Vanguard for insufficient catering to mainstream, and predict doom and gloom. Let us grognards have a game we can enjoy and call our own! We believe there is enough od us by now to sustain a full-scale MMO. The community WILL fight tooth and claw.
This will not always be the case, we will mellow out. Brad stated that getting half a mil subs would be enough for him to consider VSoH a success. If the game stays its course, and gains a strong subscription base, the specter of WoW-ization will somewhat dissipate, people will relax. We old farts can be quite congenial when noone is trying to take away our candy.

Very, very good post - illuminating and totally on target.

[Abelian75]

Actually I didn't use a strawman since a strawman completely misrepresents the person's original position. Here's a good exampled for you.

Step 1: Build the Straw Man: "Evolution is false! How could a mouse evolve into an elephant!?"

Step 2: Knock down the Straw Man by any means necessary: "How could a mouse evolve into an elephant? There would have to be billions of changes for that to occur, and nobody has ever seen speciation anyway!"

Step 3: Connect the original position to the Straw Man:"So it's silly...who has ever seen a mouse evolve into an elephant? Nobody!!"

Step 4: Claim to negate the opposing position by the connection in 3. "Therefore, evolution must be false!"

The statement is Vanguard is unfinished and my rebuttal was a direct head on to that statement with show me a game that is finished. Learn what a fallacy is before you throw the word around to make yourself look intelligent.

As a side note, that's a rather unclear example of a straw man argument (though it is an example, it just seems like it's more an example of begging the question at first glance). And yes, I see the web site you got that from.

And ONCE AGAIN, the original argument was "This game is Not-A." You responded to "This game is Not-A, and other games are A." What a straw man argument specifically means is that the attacked is not addressing the statement made by the original speaker. In the example you posted, the flaw is Step 3, when the person attacks the belief that individual mice evolve into elephants spontaneously. That is not what is being claimed, so it is a straw man argument.

What I am waiting for is for you to explain why you believe that calling a game unfinished requires a game out there to be completely finished, and to address my example of flawed vs. perfect people.

[perfect]

...
Graphics/Sound/Etc.
Performance
Fun
Class Balance
Adventuring Gameplay
Crafting + Diplomacy Gameplay
Community

- my 2cp

Oh, no, you didn't presume to make Adventuring one category and Crafting/Diplomacy another category.

Shame on you!

[Isobel]

I will try to give an answer to that. To begin with, a thoughtful review by a player who seeks long-term commitment is impossible this early. One generally can decide he never wants to see that girl again after the first date. The decision to marry usually takes a great deal longer to arrive to.

Now, on to the community. Ever seen a cornered animal? That's us. WoW is breaking records and topping the charts. Game publishing execs are seeing green. Mainstream is in. Build for the masses and watch the millions roll in. Players who have the time and will to dedicate and want something more in-depth only face one frustration after another. EQ2, SWG, Horizons, AC2, DDO, the list goes on - failed to deliver. Games in planning don't look too promising either. MAYBE the game we want is a pipe dream, but Vanguard is the only runner that looks darn close, and is strong enough to gain that critical mass an MMO needs to survive.
Yet with all the other 'diet' MMOs already out and in the making, not a minute seems to pass without some pundit climbing on a soapbox to condemn Vanguard for insufficient catering to mainstream, and predict doom and gloom. Let us grognards have a game we can enjoy and call our own! We believe there is enough od us by now to sustain a full-scale MMO. The community WILL fight tooth and claw.
This will not always be the case, we will mellow out. Brad stated that getting half a mil subs would be enough for him to consider VSoH a success. If the game stays its course, and gains a strong subscription base, the specter of WoW-ization will somewhat dissipate, people will relax. We old farts can be quite congenial when noone is trying to take away our candy.


BRAVO!!! The above is beautifully written. I would also like to point out that while WoW is currently dominating the market they are also grossly overreporting their subscription numbers. Each free trial key is counted as one subscription. Those free trials who decide to play the game regularly count as a new subscription. If you cancel and come back that's another subscription. So those of us who cancel our subscriptions every month so we don't have to deal with a monthly debit give them a new subscription every month. However people keep flashing that eight million subscription number and the spectre of WoW-ization remains.

[Abelian75]

Only after you concede that you made a false statement as a basis to attack the game.

Not only did I not make a false statement to attack the game, I didn't make ANY statement to attack the game. I haven't commented at all on it.

[Abelian75]

I like that movie.

What movie is that? I didn't intentionally quote anything.

[Rinna]

I registered to this forum just so I could say I feel EXACTLY the way the OP feels and my review of the game would be EXACTLY the same.

Very well written and VERY on point regarding the ins/outs goods/bads of Vanguard.

Kudos to you. Sigil should hire you... you might help save the sinking ship. I paid for the game just so they'd have an extra 50 bucks to use toward finishing.... I see the potential... I know the road is paved with the best intention.

I agree... stop trying to placate the minority and do what WORKS to make your game a better game. One of the best things about Blizzard is they don't coddle the whiners. The majority of gamers need SOMETHING to cry about... you could build a perfect game and still have someone unhappy about the available shades of blues for eyeballs, or whatever... they just need to complain.

To the OP, excellent review... and you speak for more than just yourself with that review, I think you hit several nails on the head.

[perfect]

What movie is that? I didn't intentionally quote anything.

Tommy Boy.

[Abelian75]

That said, why are these the criteria upon which MMOs are judged these days? If you have 6 categories and 3 of them are graphics/sound related, then fully half of the score is based upon non-gameplay related issues. Not knocking you personally, since most reviews are like that these days (and I'm guessing thats why we see so many crappy games rated so highly).


I agree, I actually think numeric scores of any kind are silly, breaking it down into "sound" and such is even sillier (no offense to the OP intended, I'm mainly referring to professional game magazines/sites). Better to just write a review and let it speak for itself.

[Isobel]

I registered to this forum just so I could say I feel EXACTLY the way the OP feels and my review of the game would be EXACTLY the same.

Very well written and VERY on point regarding the ins/outs goods/bads of Vanguard.

Kudos to you. Sigil should hire you... you might help save the sinking ship. I paid for the game just so they'd have an extra 50 bucks to use toward finishing.... I see the potential... I know the road is paved with the best intention.

I agree... stop trying to placate the minority and do what WORKS to make your game a better game. One of the best things about Blizzard is they don't coddle the whiners. The majority of gamers need SOMETHING to cry about... you could build a perfect game and still have someone unhappy about the available shades of blues for eyeballs, or whatever... they just need to complain.

To the OP, excellent review... and you speak for more than just yourself with that review, I think you hit several nails on the head.

You, like the OP assume that those of you who want the game to be easier, more like WoW, are the majority. As this game wa designed and marketed for those of us who want a more challenging game i would question that assertion.

[Jacosta]

As a side note, that's a rather unclear example of a straw man argument (though it is an example, it just seems like it's more an example of begging the question at first glance). And yes, I see the web site you got that from.

And ONCE AGAIN, the original argument was "This game is Not-A." You responded to "This game is Not-A, and other games are A." What a straw man argument specifically means is that the attacked is not addressing the statement made by the original speaker. In the example you posted, the flaw is Step 3, when the person attacks the belief that individual mice evolve into elephants spontaneously. That is not what is being claimed, so it is a straw man argument.

What I am waiting for is for you to explain why you believe that calling a game unfinished requires a game out there to be completely finished, and to address my example of flawed vs. perfect people.

It's a perfectly clear example unless you're not intelligent enough to understand what a strawman is.

The original argument was Vanguard is unfinished. My rebuttal is Show me a MMO that is finished. It is a polar opposite. Also your example of using people is an invalid comparison fallacy. Is that all you can really do is make fallacious arguments and insult people all day long?

/yawn You're beginning to bore me with your idiotic statements.

[Isobel]

Jacosta, Abelian...if you too don't stop this right now i will turn this forum around and we will go STRAIGHT HOME!

[Rourke]

you know this fight is ridiculous when nobody catches my uber "Force Five" trailer.

[Jacosta]

Jacosta, Abelian...if you too don't stop this right now i will turn this forum around and we will go STRAIGHT HOME!

Awww but mom!! /grumbles and behaves.

[Abelian75]

It's a perfectly clear example unless you're not intelligent enough to understand what a strawman is.

The original argument was Vanguard is unfinished. My rebuttal is Show me a MMO that is finished. It is a polar opposite. Also your example of using people is an invalid comparison fallacy. Is that all you can really do is make fallacious arguments and insult people all day long?

/yawn You're beginning to bore me with your idiotic statements.

Alright, either explain in your next post why a game cannot be unfinished without there existing a perfectly finished game, or this is my last post until I spot you bullying someone again. If you do not address this clearly and head-on, with extremely detailed explanations of any criticisms of my argument, I will assume that you are unable to do so and further assume that you realize that you are wrong, despite not admitting so.

Also, your final line is an ad hominem fallacy.

(It actually isn't, but you would say it was, wouldn't you?)

If you choose to step up, be sure to adress my analogy. If you want to call it an invalid comparison that's perfectly fine (and indeed that can often be said of many analogies, possibly this one as well, and if you give me a reason to I will happily adjust it), but you can't just call it that without explanation.

As far as I can tell it's a perfectly good example of why perfect examples of an object need not exist in order to be able to call an object imperfect.

[perfect]

you know this fight is ridiculous when nobody catches my uber "Force Five" trailer.

I shouldn't watch it at work, so that's why I didn't comment on it Rourke.

[Rourke]

I shouldn't watch it at work, so that's why I didn't comment on it Rourke.

i just like the music. =)

[perfect]

...As far as I can tell it's a perfectly good example of why perfect examples of an object need not exist in order to be able to call an object imperfect.

Yes?

[Jacosta]

Alright, either explain in your next post why a game cannot be unfinished without there existing a perfectly finished game, or this is my last post until I spot you bullying someone again.

If you choose to step up, be sure to adress my analogy. If you want to call it an invalid comparison that's perfectly fine (and indeed that can often be said of many analogies, possibly this one as well, and if you give me a reason to I will happily adjust it), but you can't just call it that without explanation.

As far as I can tell it's a perfectly good example of why perfect examples of an object need not exist in order to be able to call an object imperfect.

I've already explained it why it's not a good basis to use to attack the game. I guess you're not intelligent enough to read it. As for bullying someone that would be you since you have done nothing but insult me and be uncouth. Project your inadequacies onto others much?

[Calinae]

I didn't read all of these pages, so if this has been addressed, forgive me.

But it surely is a totally NO-NO for every person who has work and a normal, grown up schedule.

I am a mother, grandmother, and wife. My husband and I both play. We go to work every day, we take care of our home, our children. I would call that a normal grown up schedule. We play 2-3 hours each night and a little more on the weekends. Exactly what Brad classifies as "the core gamer".

I don't mind corpse runs. But BEFORE I do that corpse run, I think to myself, what did I do wrong.....what can I do differently so I don't do this again here..... I make adjustments. If it is apparent that I am out of my league, I summon the corpse and go on about my business with something else.

Please do not speak for everyone that you feel is what you think they should be. I have many friends that game and are adults and have that normal grown up schedule. I can speak for all of them, we LOVE THIS GAME. If we wanted a game that we could play with no hardships and easy to win, we would have gotten PS3's. We want something to help forget about the day, and we want it for a long time, not something we can complete in a few weeks.

In this game I see myself learning new things for a long long time to come. That is what my husband, myself, and a lot of our friends (Real life and gaming friends alike) were looking for. Something to hold our interest for a few years, not a few weeks.

Some people will love this game, some will hate it, I don't see much room in the middle.

Ok I am done rambling on, flame away.

[cleatus]

Kudos to you. Sigil should hire you... you might help save the sinking ship. I paid for the game just so they'd have an extra 50 bucks to use toward finishing.... I see the potential... I know the road is paved with the best intention.

I agree... stop trying to placate the minority and do what WORKS to make your game a better game. One of the best things about Blizzard is they don't coddle the whiners. The majority of gamers need SOMETHING to cry about... you could build a perfect game and still have someone unhappy about the available shades of blues for eyeballs, or whatever... they just need to complain.

Actually, the consensus, even from people who actively hated the game for months, is that the launch has gone pretty well so far. And, from the amount of stores that are out of the stock, the game is definitely selling. Just because the game is not how you and the OP would like does not mean it is "sinking," in fact it is doing better than expectations. There is more than one successful way to make a game.

The main "whiner" in this thread is the OP's "review" itself.

[Kates]

This thread is lingering like a stale fart in a car.

[Alcandor]

I'll probably regret this but...

The reason this argument is still going on between you two is that you're BOTH right.

Jacosta,

Abelian75 is saying that just because there's not a finished MMO in existence, does not mean that this game is any less "unfinished". In other words... Jacosta, you are not a perfect human being. That statement is true despite the fact that there are no perfect human beings on this planet.

That holds true here. VG is not finished despite the fact that there are no finished MMO's out there. Just like you are not perfect despite the fact that there are no perfect human beings out there.

Just because there are no finished MMO's out there does not mean that VG can not be "unfinished."

Indeed, by your very argument, you're saying that VG is unfinished because there's no such thing as a finished MMO. Therefore, VG is unfinished.

HOWEVER, Jacosta you are right at the same time. You can not attack VG for being "unfinished" because there's no such thing as a finished MMO. In 10 years, Abelian75 can come to these forums and say that VG is unfinished and be correct... so it doesn't make any sense to argue that point now. VG will NEVER be finished. So you can't use that as an attack on the game.

HOWEVER... all that doesn't matter because everyone is hung up on one word... "unfinished". I think that what (whoever said that) meant was that this is "less finished" at launch than other games that they've played. Other games have had more "stuff" at launch than this game.

I don't know... I don't want to get pulled into this... but you guys are still arguing because you're both right.

[Abelian75]

It's a perfectly clear example unless you're not intelligent enough to understand what a strawman is.


The reason it's unclear, in case you actually care, is that it seems like it's illustrating a begging the question fallacy, in which one uses as an argument the very claim they're trying to prove. The example gives the impression that all they are arguing is, "Evolution is ridiculous, because evolution is ridiculous."

Yes, there is a strawman in there, but it is less clear that it could be. The examples at the bottom of this page are better: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html

[perfect]

I didn't read all of these pages, so if this has been addressed, forgive me....

...I am a mother, grandmother, and wife. My husband and I both play. We go to work every day, we take care of our home, our children. I would call that a normal grown up schedule. We play 2-3 hours each night and a little more on the weekends. Exactly what Brad classifies as "the core gamer". ....

First off, I don't blame you for not reading all of the pages. Who would?

<looks at Jacosta>

Secondly, I'm in the same airplane (I'm tired of using 'same boat'). I work, I take care of my home, I take care of 'the kids', and still manage to get 2-3 hours a night (cept Date Night, of course) and 10-15 hours on the weekend.

Never thought of myself as 'core' though.

[sweetdigs]

That was a horrid review. I hope you never get involved in designing games and that Sigil never listens to any suggestions you might have regarding what is best for Vanguard in the long run. May God have mercy on your soul.

[Jacosta]

I'll probably regret this but...

The reason this argument is still going on between you two is that you're BOTH right.

Jacosta,

Abelian75 is saying that just because there's not a finished MMO in existence, does not mean that this game is any less "unfinished". In other words... Jacosta, you are not a perfect human being. That statement is true despite the fact that there are no perfect human beings on this planet.

That holds true here. VG is not finished despite the fact that there are no finished MMO's out there. Just like you are not perfect despite the fact that there are no perfect human beings out there.

Just because there are no finished MMO's out there does not mean that VG can not be "unfinished."

Indeed, by your very argument, you're saying that VG is unfinished because there's no such thing as a finished MMO. Therefore, VG is unfinished.

HOWEVER, Jacosta you are right at the same time. You can not attack VG for being "unfinished" because there's no such thing as a finished MMO. In 10 years, Abelian75 can come to these forums and say that VG is unfinished and be correct... so it doesn't make any sense to argue that point now. VG will NEVER be finished. So you can't use that as an attack on the game.

HOWEVER... all that doesn't matter because everyone is hung up on one word... "unfinished". I think that what (whoever said that) meant was that this is "less finished" at launch than other games that they've played. Other games have had more "stuff" at launch than this game.

I don't know... I don't want to get pulled into this... but you guys are still arguing because you're both right.

I never asserted that the game was finished. In fact, the game is unfinished due to the nature of the genre. My point as you so eloguently put it, "So you can't use that as an attack on the game."

[perfect]

...I don't know... I don't want to get pulled into this... but you guys are still arguing because you're both right.

Too late. *I* personally think they are still arguing cause they are both wrong.

You want to argue that with me, Alcandor?

[Abelian75]

I'll probably regret this but...

HOWEVER, Jacosta you are right at the same time. You can not attack VG for being "unfinished" because there's no such thing as a finished MMO. In 10 years, Abelian75 can come to these forums and say that VG is unfinished and be correct... so it doesn't make any sense to argue that point now. VG will NEVER be finished. So you can't use that as an attack on the game.


As lovely as it is when both people are right, this isn't the case. You CAN say you don't like a game because it is unfinished. You cannot attack it because it is unfinished and every other game IS finished, however. But saying you do not like it because it feels like a very unfinished product is perfectly reasonable.

Saying it is unreasonable involves willfully misunderstanding what someone means by "unfinished." They are not saying that they expect it to be finished, they are saying they expect is to be less unfinished. They may not be able to articulate this perfectly, but it's the responsibility of the reader to try to understand what the person is saying.

[Faite]

I never asserted that the game was finished. In fact, the game is unfinished due to the nature of the genre. My point as you so eloguently put it, "So you can't use that as an attack on the game."

It is more Jacosta's approach to people I think, than the true content of what he tries to get across.

[Rourke]

Another trailer to dance to. Don't watch Perfect....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOW8uJxLlUQ

[Faite]

It is more Jacosta's approach to people I think, than the true content of what he tries to get across.

lol I dont even know what the OP said anymore :/

[Letsinod]

Best comment from the review, "Then came the game that changed it all...World of warcraft" Yes, WoW did change one thing....rudeness in MMO's.

[Abelian75]

Indeed, by your very argument, you're saying that VG is unfinished because there's no such thing as a finished MMO. Therefore, VG is unfinished.


Good catch, I hadn't brought that up because, while interesting logically, it's kinda unnecessary to bring up yet another confusing argument over an obviously reasonable statement.

[Eternal]

Actually, the consensus, even from people who actively hated the game for months, is that the launch has gone pretty well so far. And, from the amount of stores that are out of the stock, the game is definitely selling.

I don't think the game is a failure but it's far too early to call it a retail success, my BB is out of stock but was *never* in stock.

You can't attribute all out of stock to the game being sold out, retailers were cautious.

The good news, if you like the game this should not matter.

[Faite]

Best comment from the review, "Then came the game that changed it all...World of warcraft" Yes, WoW did change one thing....rudeness in MMO's.

Now that isn't true, rudeness even existed in text MUD's. Anyone ever heard of hingfdiuh who played Dragonrealms? heh.

No, WOW did not bring this about, it simply has SO many subscribers that by sheer numbers and ratios you have more of it.

[Alcandor]

Too late. *I* personally think they are still arguing cause they are both wrong.

You want to argue that with me, Alcandor?

You are soooooo going down.

You can't have two wrongs in an arguement. It's like a double negative... it makes is positive.

So... if they're both wrong, they both have to be right... right?

[Jacosta]

It is more Jacosta's approach to people I think, than the true content of what he tries to get across.

Funny but my approach to you was being polite. I suggest you stop projecting your flaws onto me and admit that your basis for attacking the game was a logical fallacy.

[Jacosta]

Good catch, I hadn't brought that up because, while interesting logically, it's kinda unnecessary to bring up yet another confusing argument over an obviously reasonable statement.

Actually her statement was an unreasonable one due to the fact that no MMO is ever finished.

[Faite]

Funny but my approach to you was being polite. I suggest you stop projecting your flaws onto me and admit that your basis for attacking the game was a logical fallacy.

No you are not polite, you may 'think' you are polite, and I will leave it at that, as I already once regressed to childhood by participating in arguing with you. (you actually prodded me until I responded...go back and read you saying things like 'oh yea run away when your wrong neener neener (not verbatim but your meaning was just that) )

[Abelian75]

I've already explained it why it's not a good basis to use to attack the game. I guess you're not intelligent enough to read it. As for bullying someone that would be you since you have done nothing but insult me and be uncouth. Project your inadequacies onto others much?

Sweet, you didn't give a clear explanation. I leave victorious.

Rest assured I will surface again if I spot you bullying someone else.

[Isobel]

Neither of you has been particularly polite. NOW STOP IT. All you're doing is keeping the moronic review at the to of the page.

[Faite]

Sweet, you didn't give a clear explanation. I leave victorious.

Rest assured I will surface again if I spot you bullying someone else.

lol, he is the defender of the underdog! I like it. Wait, wasn't there a super hero called underdog?! And uh, he had a girlfriend, what was her name again?

[Jacosta]

No you are not polite, you may 'think' you are polite, and I will leave it at that, as I already once regressed to childhood by participating in arguing with you. (you actually prodded me until I responded...go back and read you saying things like 'oh yea run away when your wrong neener neener (not verbatim but your meaning was just that) )

I wanted you to answer the question in an adult manner, but instead you acted like a 2 year old that got caught.

[perfect]

You are soooooo going down.

You can't have two wrongs in an arguement. It's like a double negative... it makes is positive.

So... if they're both wrong, they both have to be right... right?

Tsk, don'tcha know that two wrongs don't make a right? Three lefts make a right, but not two wrongs.

Conversely (I know), 8M wrongs make up a WoW.

[Nikkoli]

Looks like its time to move this thread to the volcano.

[Jacosta]

Sweet, you didn't give a clear explanation. I leave victorious.

Rest assured I will surface again if I spot you bullying someone else.

Care to show everyone where I bullied someone? I didn't but you sure as hell did by attacking me personally.

[perfect]

Neither of you has been particularly polite. NOW STOP IT. All you're doing is keeping the moronic review at the to of the page.

<hug>

I can't help it. It's like watching a car wreck. In slow motion.

[Solondel]

One problem is that unfinished is a relative term, whereas finished is not.

A car that is complete except for the little Vehicle ID Number plate is unfinished; so is a car without a transmission. Both are unfinished - it's a matter of degree.

You can call something finished when it meets a pre-established set of criteria for completion. You're making it - you can define the criteria any way you like. Then others can compare what you've made to the criteria set out.

Vanguard is certainly unfinished. There are features planned for the game that are not there yet. It hasn't met the criteria the developers set out - yet.

Perhaps I'm weird, but that was part of the appeal to me. I've never been in an MMORPG since the beginning, and I wanted to experience the growth, evolution and maturing that happens in these games.

So far, I've enjoyed myself. It's not been painless - I was DC'd a few times over the weekend, and died as a result a couple of times. I knew what I was signing up for when I went for early access. It's all good.

[Alcandor]

lol, he is the defender of the underdog! I like it. Wait, wasn't there a super hero called underdog?! And uh, he had a girlfriend, what was her name again?

Polly.

And Underdog's secret identity was "Shoeshine Boy".

[Faite]

I wanted you to answer the question in an adult manner, but instead you acted like a 2 year old that got caught.

yea......right.

[Rinna]

You, like the OP assume that those of you who want the game to be easier, more like WoW, are the majority. As this game wa designed and marketed for those of us who want a more challenging game i would question that assertion.

Designed and marketed for, but not supported.

Greed and money will always win out unfortunately. Don't talk... just watch.

[Joodah]

I agree with the corpse runs being unneeded. I trully believe in a penalty of some sort, and feeling a sense of danger. However, it is and always will be a time sink, nothing more, when other alternatives could have been implemented. But I know I'm in the minority on that. :p

[perfect]

We done?

[Abelian75]

Care to show everyone where I bullied someone? I didn't but you sure as hell did by attacking me personally.

Here. All in response to Faite, save where noted.

"Are you even going to bother to back up your statement regarding Vanguard being unfinished by answering my question or are you going to stick your head in the sand and ignore it?"

"I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. " (in support of McPally, who was himself responding to Faite)

"You mean security in knowing that you've made a stupid comment and got called on it? You made the assertation that Vanguard is the only MMO that is unfinished. I'm requiring to back that assertation up with actual facts by presenting all of us with one MMO that has never needed a single patch or a single expansion."

Then, amusingly:

"Instead of answering a simple question you insult me. How typical for someone who played WoW and I'm not surprised. Those that can't debate insult and in doing so lose. You were saying something about me being 16 when I have yet to insult you or use vulgar language against you? Looks like the only person being the adult is me since I haven't stooped to your level.."

You're a bad person, Jacosta, or at least you are one on these forums. You deserved everything you got in this thread. And yes, I am perfectly willing to judge people as people by their behavior on internet forums.

Now I really am done, period. You need to stop insulting people on these threads, Jacosta. Let people believe what they believe. If you try to diminish them as people the next time someone says something you don't agree with, I'll be there again, because I am insane like that. You are a detriment to this community.

I am going to play Vanguard now.

[Alcandor]

We done?

No!

3 lefts don't make a right unless the person passes the point of the original left... which you can't assume he does.

So, 3 lefts return you to your original spot with a bright future for a possible right.

Everyone knows that. :rolleyes:

[DCpunk]

How was any of that bullying? They seemed like valid comments to me. Calling a comment stupid is a whole lot different than calling a person stupid.

[Abelian75]

How was any of that bullying? They seemed like valid comments to me. Calling a comment stupid is a whole lot different than calling a person stupid.

Uh, you think this is ok to say?

"I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. "

I disagree and will call anyone out who talks like that. He in fact called Faite a fool directly there.

[DCpunk]

Uh, you think this is ok to say?

"I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. "

I disagree and will call anyone out who talks like that. He in fact called Faite a fool directly there.

a bit harsh? probably. Deserved? definitely.

[perfect]

No!

3 lefts don't make a right unless the person passes the point of the original left... which you can't assume he does.

So, 3 lefts return you to your original spot with a bright future for a possible right.

Everyone knows that. :rolleyes:

I actually had to get graph paper out and draw this. You're right.

Now I'm making a dungeon. Kobold dungeon. yeah. Maybe a few gelatinous cubes, too. They like being around kobolds.

[Alcandor]

I actually had to get graph paper out and draw this.

http://209.85.62.25/6463/57/emo/2rofl.gif

[Abelian75]

a bit harsh? probably. Deserved? definitely.

I disagree completely, but that's beside the point. The point is that Jacosta claims to be polite and civil. Furthermore, he actually scolded Faite for insulting him while KNOWING he just did so to her, yet claiming to have not insulted her! That's the worst kind of offense in my mind, willfully misrepresenting the facts in order to win support.

And before anyone says anything, I AM playing VG now! I'm just... alt-tabbing... cuz I'm weird like that.

[perfect]

http://209.85.62.25/6463/57/emo/2rofl.gif

I like laughs so much better than I like shouts. Thank you for the image.

[ShadeVice]

I dont find this review very accurate. at all.

Seems biased towards casual gaming.

Reviews cant be biased or they just turn into a long-winded opinion.

And an opinion you are deffinately welcome to.

Good thing that these forums are all mostly players so a review hardly matters.

Reviews usualy only help/influance people who havent played the game.

But nice try, perhaps you will learn from this.

[perfect]

...But nice try, perhaps you will learn from this.

Excuse me? Since when do you dictate what and when and how I will learn from something?

[Jacosta]

Uh, you think this is ok to say?

"I love it when people say something really stupid. I really enjoy it when they go running after showing people what a fool that person is for making a stupid and ignorant comment. "

I disagree and will call anyone out who talks like that. He in fact called Faite a fool directly there.

Actually I didn't call her a fool since her comment already established that fact. Pointing out facts in evidence does not make it any less valid.