I have had a long past with massive online games, which has been a real journey of pleasure and pain. My first exposure to them was when my then girlfriend announced that she was suddenly moving to Amsterdam gifting me with a lot of free time and not much to fill it up.
So, I turned to Everquest just for a laugh.
Before that time I had been put off by the whole fantasy genre, broadband didn’t exist and the idea of paying £30 a month in combined fees to Verant and the bastards at British Telecom was always sobering enough to keep me away. Once in the game things didn’t improve, I had no idea how one played an MMO or what stats go where, and I must have been the only EQ1 warrior with a good INT score. I named him after a samurai poet I liked known as Basho.
That was the start of an identity that now still follows me around the internet in even into real life. You see I became hopelessly addicted and immerged in the game, my guild and the character of a brave and courageous human warrior lost in a wild land. People say, “Oh, so you wanted to be that person?” In fact the truth is far simpler; I was Basho. Both James and Basho were facets of the same person lived through different realities.
Soon, however, I was wondering just who was living in everyday reality, the warrior poet or the investment banker? Was I playing Basho or was he playing me? In which life had I faced dragons, giant monsters and many many orks?
1 year later my girlfriend returned to England and to me, having consented to become my wife, so at level 52 I went cold turkey; took off my cobolt armour, dropped my Jagged Longsword and put Basho away.
Or so I thought, soon broadband had arrived in the UK and Basho again took up his sword. This time in the future of a “galaxy far far away”. His character didn’t change, in Everquest Basho had been a human warrior and so it was in Star Wars Galaxies that he became a human Heavy Swordsman. The same guild, but a different game. However, all too soon the endgame of SWG was reached and although it did not
demand the life-sucking addiction of EQ1 Basho was soon one of the most powerful PVE players on the server with my adventures being serialised by a website eager to publish tips for new hunters. Stuck for something to do and disgusted by the route to Jedi, I quit and Basho rested once again.
Only to rise with the waxing of EQ2, but unfortunately, that game waned all too soon and Basho again became a part of me hidden away from my everyday reality, the part that longs for adventure in digital woodlands.
Waiting for a time and a game that would provide the depths Basho needs to shine.
Has that time come? Let’s find out, as in front of me is the new game from the creator of Everquest; Vanguard. Armed with a very nice computer (4400X2 / 2Gb RAM / 7900GTX), some real life friends and the phone number of Game Addicts Anonymous I have dived in and this is what I have found.
Vanguard
… is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mindboggingly big it is. I mean you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to [VANGUARD]. Listen …
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
When installing a game that not only comes on two DVD’s (!) and takes 20 gb of space, but that then also takes 2 hours to patch, you know that it has been designed by Someone who,
- Is determined to cover all the angles, providing a large fantasy experience you can really get your gaming teeth into. A tour-de-force epic adventure.
- Has shares in VERITAS.
The install was not painful, but it was long, so long that I only got to play for 25 minutes before having to turn in at midnight. I knew then that this game was serious. My choice of server had been set by my dear friend Trip getting in before me and so with eagerness we joined the throng at the doors of Fegrott.
Something I was not expecting was the ability to customise my characters look as much as was possible. All sorts of stats such as size, race, colour, age, facial features etc are available to customise and it is possible to create someone quite unique. It wasn’t quiet as detailed as the options within the single player game and sequel to Morrowind; Oblivion (a comparison we will come back to later), but it was flexible. My final build of character looks a little like me (so my wife flatters me enough to say) and Trip tells me upon meeting me that I look every inch the Gentlemen Knight.
Trip, however, looked like a age scraggy old killer come corpse raider who had fallen on bad times but still was able to bite. Hard. Just like real life then! (/joke!)
So, basically, it works to differentiate well between players.
Upon entering the game I was introduced to one of the best thought our newbie areas I had ever seen. Much has been made of Vanguard graphics and I think that they are excellent. On my system the movement is smooth and the ping is good. Apart from that I will let the screenshots speak for themselves. Suffice to say that this game is fast approaching the level of sophistication that we currently find in off-line games such as Oblivion.
It is not a flavoured or some like it some don’t type of situation like EQ2 or WOW, rather it simply wonderful to look at. Vanguard does not have zones or “wait-loading” messages and I could see from the top of a hill a large span of green pastures and farms leading to a small town on the crook of a river and behind me what looked like a monks abbey. Upon entering the abbey I came across the head Inquisitor who gave me my first quest; fedex.
A FedEx Quest is a common or slang term for a type of mission in a computer role-playing game. It is named after the FedEx Corporation, based on the task at hand.
At first I was disappointed but determined to run through whatever boring FedEx quests they came up with but I quickly found that they had actually managed to make a FedEx interesting. Asked to speak to various guards, newbie quests flow one into another and all are to do with the Lore of the area. They involve a lot of doing things that the guards can’t get away to do because of the troubles in the area. Basically the local mages guild building has exploded and evil brownies called redcaps have invaded the conclave. Plus the usual walking dead, strange fish, forest terrors and wizards-kids (who have taken over an cave called The Rift.) All of the missions in the entire area revolve around this lore and it is a breath of fresh air to have such a long running and intricately weaved series of adventures.
After killing some undead, hunting a few Red Caps (which kicked my ass to begin with) and collecting rewards I had enough silver saved to head into town and try buy some new gear. The town is called Tursh and it is a ramshackle collection of houses, pubs and wooden offices that passes for the administrative center for all the farmers in the area. I talked to some vendors, perused the stall and eventually found the Exchange. This is the game’s built in sales forum where anything and everything in latest edition hand-me-downs can be picked up. Soon I spied some bargains and quickly kitted myself out in a basic set of tank armour with a greatsword on my back.
I continued happily beating up various monsters for coin in the wide choice and variety of newbie missions until one day I saw someone cut down a tree. I don’t mean a obviously marked special “cut me down” tree, I mean he just ran up to a tree and cut it down. And it fell in a beautiful animation leaving behind a stump. I asked the player what he was doing and he explained that he was a woodcutter and collecting wood to use in crafting. Now I have played many games before, but mostly I have stayed away from the crafting side of things. Vanguard is different. Crafting is a very large part of the game so I ran off to the trainers to learn how to do it. In Vanguard you can choose two specialism’s in crafting and I took mining and skinning as I felt these would best enable me to collect money from my adventures (and perhaps mine something nice from The Rift.)
The missions to training your character are well worth it and give you new clothing that confers buffs to your endeavors. You see in Vanguard you have three sets of clothes. Adventure, Harvest and Diplomacy. All these sets are carried with you on your toon and switching between them is automatic when using the corresponding skills. Upon trying my hand a blacksmithing I could see that the process was deeply complex and involved and much more like SWG crafting than EQ1/2.
Next came Diplomacy. Pre release a lot of people were confused about the reasons for having such a facet to the game and what value could be derived from playing a diplomat. The larger concerns are as yet unknown to us all but the newbie missions are fun and involving, opening up a whole different set of missions, quests and objectives based around a sort of “Magic the Gathering” style card game.
This game is very involved and quite good fun once you get the hang of its structure (which isn’t immediately obvious I must say) and if you are a player who likes to feel part of something this is definitely a path you will want to investigate. The potential for this I guess is it being utilized in quests, which sounds wicked* to me.
An example of a low end quest was given to me by a Shimerleaf Brownie Elder. His countrymen had been captured and imprisoned by the wizardy Rift-kids and would I please go rescue a few. Sure, no problems. In the forest there are many wandering Rift-kids with a brownie in tow and defeating one in combat frees the little fella. Upon completion of this quest he gave me another; get a few bunches of berries. Done, ok now what? Well, could I please sneak into the forest prison and convince his countrymen to rise up and escape? How? I had seen this prison and it was surrounded by high end Rift-kids and without a group it was impossible to invade. The brownie simply smiles and with a squish of the berries I was turned into a brownie myself.
In this form I could run very fast and had a very low agro. I snuck into the prison and spoke to the captured brownies under the gaze of the large and difficult prison guard. They agreed to try and escape and together we attacked.
Combat in Vanguard is similar to many games you have played before. More involved than most for sure. Monsters are rated in strength using the same green-to-red colours as most games, but they also have a number of bubbles that signifies if they are a boss type mob that requires help to down. Once in battle you can spam a number of special moves and powers depending on your class but also buff and counter attack if you are lucky enough to block a strike. Counter attacking as a warrior means clicking a separate button before a timer counts down and delivering extra damage to your opponent. You can also daze them, frighten them, boost your strength for a few seconds and even hit them in the flanks if you are to the sides of back of their character. Similar to the best parts of SWG and far better than EQ1/2.
My brownie brothers and I took the big guy down quick smart and the quest was completed. Rewards are slightly underpowered but then this is a newbie quest.
Dying is a fact of life, but in MMO’s dying needs to be finely balanced between risk and reward. Vanguard reintroduces the naked corpse run, but allows you to summon your corpse to the resurrection altar if you can’t get to it. The upshot is that summoning your corpse has a large XP hit and a hit on the durability of your items (IE a financial hit too.) Whereas retrieving your corpse yourself is harder but you gain back much of what you would loose and no durability hit. Your choice.
Soon I was breaching the highs of lvl 9 and looking towards the more outer lying quests and indeed The Rift itself.
To venture there is best within a group and so Trip and I grouped with a nice Cleric called Elron and together made our way inside The Rift. As the leader of a group you can set the loot options with a nice level of granularity. You can set rolling on loot of a certain quality or better, round robin, or free for all. I personally set it on rolling on rare items only and then let everyone have Need-before-Greed on the rest. But meh, up to the players.
The Rift is the first serious dungeon many players will come across and I was not prepared for the amazing size. As you venture into the cave, killing as you go, NPC brownies flee passed you adding to atmosphere. At the bottom of the cave is a large statue, which beacons you to speak the password.
We were wondering what that was when an NPC Rift-wizard-kid wandered up and spoke. I quickly made a macro with that line and upon speaking it teleported to a new area. While not an instance, this was at least far away from the rest of the newb fodder. The halls we were in were simply huge! I was taken a little back by the size.
This was The Rift Seeker Lair and we needed to complete a few quests in here to find out the source of the plague of brownies upon Tursh. Upon fighting our way to the end of the hall we were greeted by doors into large room full of the wizards, which we struck down mercilessly. Opening a side door we found a large stairs down and at the end another massive hall. I was wondering how big this zone could be! Another snake statue teleported us outside in some strange world and we adventured there through the night gaining much XP.
The next night I ventured down with a different group (as off-tank) this time and I truly came to realise how deep the level went. Below the second snake room there was another large stair down, then another very large room full of brownies being tortured. Then a very large hall with a high level Boss at the end. Upon beating him there is another snake statue that teleported us into crypt full of undead brownies. Past them lay another crypt full of undead warriors and wizards and after three halls of the undead we came to a large room full of flying demons all level 12 and above (certain death for me alone.) It is no exaggeration that the combat and hard shield-biting teeth-rattling battle needed to get this far was one of the more hardcore nights of online gaming I have ever been a part of. And this was just a four man pick up group of two clerics, a Ranger and me. By then end and the inevitable group wipe I was physically exhausted just playing this game. If this was newbie level stuff, then the full enchilada must be some meal of an adventure! EQ2 had nothing that felt like this. This is old school EQ1 beatings.
I loved it.
As you can see, there is much to love about this game, for example, all the stats, even ones warriors don’t usually use, are in fact useful. There is no min maxing here. Or perhaps the fact that mounts are everywhere. Or that successful diplomacy games gifts the entire town various 1 hour buffs. Or perhaps that it took Trip 45 minutes of riding on his horse to get to the next big town. Or that you can use equipment above your level, but not too many pieces at the same time or you can’t wear it.
There is also much that is unfinished. There are common graphical glitches when I open bags and windows. There are also one or two CTD’s and auto log-offs. I even once got stuck in the landscape running from giant spiders and was eaten alive. The graphics are very special, but you need a monster rig to play full detail. Not to mention that some mobs warp like in the old EQ1 days. But, frankly, thus far Vanguard has managed to light the fires in this jaded old warrior and for the foreseeable future Basho will be there and I will be with him.
*Note to Americans; wicked is slang for good!
Basho
Basho & Cesca are traveling with:
Related Posts |
Digg it!
|
Share THIS |
