AoC: Early Impressions - Discussion of "Open" Beta
I gave it a reasonable run tonight, taking my priest of to level 8, exploring a little, and toying around with the settings a lot.
The graphics are amazing.. almost too good. There's plantlife galore, changes in elevation, and the town of Tortage felt very primative and real. Excellent stuff. Sometimes, it was hard to see around or through all the environment. Running it on our AMD Dual X2 6400+ and a nVidia 8800GT, I had most graphics turned up. I started out at High and just adjusted some down a little (shadows to medium, come to mind) to make sure I held steady around 60 FPS at 1680x1050 res. Latency was good all night - 100 to 160, except for a couple of notable spikes. Despite that, though, I did crash out about 6 times over 3 hours or so. Why? I am not sure. There was rarely any warning, stuttering, or noticable lag.
One thing they do need to figure out, though, is how to make sure you are in the same "instance" version of the towns, sub-zones, etc. Grouping up with Hanta ended up being frustrating because we were in different version of the same town (on the same server) but even with Hanta's attempts at summoning (as group leader) to his zone, we could never find each other. That, simply put, has to change.
Priest of Mitra: At this point, it's hard to give a true impression. I am certainly squishy, and multiple mobs cause me a lot of trouble. The HoT is pretty worthless, to be honest, except as a tool in hit-and-run encounters or retreat. It certainly doesn't allow me to stand in a fight that I am overmatched in to start. The attack spells are pretty good. Smite has a longish cast time, but does significant damage (at this point), at least in comparison to my melee and is my bread and butter. I got an instant cast (longish CD) spell at 7th that I use kind of like First Blast (?) as a WoW Mage. Cast Smite, pop the instant, Smite again, melee. It felt rather familiar, though. However...
Melee Combat was interesting. The visual queues on where to attack, etc., was actually fun. I might have to try a barbarian or warrior type to get into that more. I do not, however, have a clue on how to change my own shielding on the fly.. heck.. I barely can change it when sitting quietly in a tavern.
Some other things that struck me was that the UI will need some help. I hope they open it up to fan/third-party users like WoW did as this may be what Blizzard has done best. The AddOns of WoW add so much flavor, personalization, and enhancement to the game. I couldn't figure out how to map keys to some of the optional button slots, etc. Right now, not such a big deal, but as more and more skills or spells are uncovered/gained, it will be very significant.
The story in the Destiny Quests was quite interesting and I found myself enjoying the cut-scenes and plot. This is a big plus for me. The more involved in the world I feel, the more I want to revist it.
Encounters were not easy. Getting ganged up on (as a Priest at least) was a death sentence, unless you didn't mind using the shift key to sprint out of there (which I did a lot!). I'd really like to see how it plays in groups, at least at a little higher level, to give a real impression.
Beyond that.. there's so much more to be seen to say whether or not I'd want to stay there for a long time, but there is so much potential there, to be sure. I am definitely looking forward to trying some more of it and I have my fingers crossed that they'll iron out some of the (currently) game breaking bugs.
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven
I played a barbarian up to level 10 tonight. Going into it I read that Barbarians had a hard time taking multiple mobs. Maybe that info is for life post-Tortage or from an older build. I was easily taking on three mobs at a time that were the same level. I died once and it didn't make sense. I had just cleared an area within my first destiny quest's instance when all of a sudden two mobs popped right on top of me while I was recuperating from a three mob fight and was low on health. Maybe the PvE game was saying "Ready for PvP", but the same thing happened later in the same instance so I'm pretty sure there is a weird spawn bug.
I got kicked from the server multiple times. My client didn't crash while in-game, but it crashes when it is cleaning up on exit. I was subject to some horrible load times. At one point it took 10 minutes to load a zone. I had good latency though.
When I zoned into the Underhalls or the cave by the docks I noticed my fps drop down to single digits for about 30 seconds after I came back from the load screen for the zone. I was running at about ~45fps average at 1280x1024 on medium (I also turned shadows and bloom off and set the shader to 2.0). This is on a 4200 x2 @2.4gHz/2gb RAM/7900GT.
I don't like "!" quest givers showing up on the map when you aren't high enough level for their quest. There is too much mini-map clutter in general. I am definitely not a fan of the UI overall.
This is an example of some minor textual things that need to be fixed ...
I'm going to give a few other classes a try over the next week or two. The melee combat was a refreshing change from auto-attack. I like the gameplay so far and I've had fun. Can't wait to see this after a few months of post-release patching.
WoW chars-
Maxoxo 42 Gnome Affliction Warlock - Blackhand/Thurston 31 Human DW Fury Warrior - Blackhand (originally on Greymane)
Dohmy 70 Undead Mutilate Rogue (retired) - Nazjatar (originally on Mal'Ganis then Ysondre)
The game is buggier then a $10 hooker, but I enjoyed it. I was only able to make my way to Tortage and to level 5 before bed time called. That being said - load times were atrocious. In the 60 minutes I actually played - 30 minutes were spent in coming back in from crash to sign in screen and/or zone load times. I had significant latency/lag/slowwwnesss in the character design screen as well. I created a Dark Templar and he was quite handy in melee combat, being able to take on 2-3 mobs his own level up until the apes - two apes same level gave him issues. The stuttering and lag really impacted game play and I had my settings dialed back to low at 1024*768. That being said even at such a low res the game was nice to look at. I enjoyed the combat mechanic especially the hit detection and shield design on my opponents. The ability to set your shields may be valuable in PvP but in PvE combat was over rather quickly so I ended up just equally distibuting my shield around me. The shield doesnt cover the back so I can see positioning in combat actually meaning something while grouped both in PvP and PvE. I also encountered a number of placeholder graphic issues for loot, a timer bar that popped up with gibberish text within it, the occasional stuttering of sound, and some placeholder text in quests. Despite being as unstable as an alcoholic on a booze cruise the game was fun and I am looking forward to playing it through the weekend. I recognize that it is beta and we are doing a stress test so it gets cut some slack. There are serious issues that need to be addressed - especially the load times and latency in the character design screen which will turn a significant user base away if not corrected prior to launch. Current MMO players will look to WoW and will not likely tolerate the state of the game as it is now. The issues I encountered would be launch day killers, but I anticipate most, if not all will be corrected in the next couple of weeks as Funcom adjusts to the server load and population base.
XBL Gamertag
SI VIS PACEM, PARA BELLUM "IF YOU SEEK PEACE... PREPARE FOR WAR"
PUBLIUS RENATUS, 390 AD
Couple of points:
-Adjusting your shields in combat isn't needed really at all in PvE until probably level 30-40+. It can be argued the same can be said for PvP. Adjusting your shields will be a min/max issue at end game levels.
-Performance issues are the biggest hurdles. What's amusing is that right now it's amazing how much better it is compared to 2 weeks ago. It truely was only playable for about 30min 1hr at a time. I've really been worried until a couple patches ago. If you goto the game folder and start the game up by just the .exe the game will start up first with a dos app window that then calls the graphical engine. I've noticed that the stutters and lockups i get now are due to the debugger stepping on it's own toes. So they're definitely working on this issue
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This part was literally added monday or tuesday. There's other things you'll find like this throughout the game.
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
I've been tinkering with this game for several months. Even up to now it's a mess. The potential for something great is there but in it's current state it's a clunky clickfest. Graphically it's very nice but that doesn't overcome the multiple issues. Walking into an Inn and having to wait for a load screen is annoying as all hell.
It might be a great game someday but for now it's a long way off.
Ahhh you're one of them
While i'd say this is true for mages since they've not had spell weaving i dont notice this with melee classes.
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
Here's what I don't get. There was a lot of early talk about how different combat was going to be from the WoW type autoshoot. Somehow pressing 4,5,6, or 7 then following up either a 1,2, or 3 isn't a whole lot different from hitting Charge, Rend and Mortal Strike. Sure there's a bit more reactionary input but not enough to overcome the issues.
I'm not saying the game will always be crap but being a beta tester has convinced me not to pre-order.
I did not find the load times long at all in fact they were rather fast and while I am not a a fan of hard zone lines so far it seems to be working ok for me.
I do have a E8200 CPU and 4GB of ram using Raptor X drives in a RAID-0 config so maybe that is helping my load times?
I only played a bit last night but I did get my barbarian to about level 7. During that time I dropped from the game world once and only bugs I noticed was the Voice overs did not always match the text and the pop-ups in top left corner didn't do anything when I clicked on them.
I did not mess with settings too much but on High at 1600 X 1050 I was getting about 35fps on medium about 60 fps. My graphics card is an 8800gtx so guessing I could get decent performance on high if I turn down a few things. Of course turning on AA killed my frame rates.
In true, do not read anything form, I jumped right into the game basically when I got home at 5pm EST. It patched quickly and everything loaded up and ran fine. I was a bit caught off guard with how combat worked since I avoided reading or watching anything but after a few fights figured it out.
I still have a lot to learn and see but my first hour or so of playing left me wanting to play more (which is more then I can say for another high profile game in beta that I been testing for a while and lost interest in)
Except for being similar to FPS i can't imagine how else they can do it...
Yea you have to hit a bunch of buttons. Bit more reactionary? It's totally reactionary. If you dont hit a button you dont attack. It's defnitely different from WoW.
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
Oddly, I completely disagree here, Bear. I am finding myself having to break bad habits I have gained in WoW.
Example: If I start combat with Smite, Smite, Blast, and then whack away at some attack direction key, they all queue up in that order. In WoW, I am trying to time the GCD, and sometimes you are just mashing trying to get that spell or attack off. In AoC, though, that's a big mistake. What if I need to pop a heal potion? Or what if the enemy's shielding shifts (which happened often)? You got stuff in the pipes you'll have to cancel out of (without going to far and pulling up the options menu).
No... it's not like WoW at all in that regard. I find myself watching and reacting, timing my attacks and reading the situation, a lot more already.
Load Times: I am not getting those at alll, and my machine (I am testing on) is not that great. I don't understand the disparity.
Bugs/Disconnects: These, however, I hope will get ironed out through Beta. Not to mention more cosmetic (though important) features such as the UI or problems with grouping.
I hesitate to call it a crappy game until I see how quickly they attend to some of the current problems. If they are updating/fixing fast, it will give me great hope for a lot of progress in the next couple of weeks.
Oh, and Ran is right... no auto attack..
I remember Krindle mentioning resently that he disconnected in the middle of a boss battle in Kara (I believe). Came back, and was in perfect health, everything was going smoothly. Truth is, half the time, people could disconnect and come back doing well enough (except casters).
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven
In the pvp weekend you could always tell the WoW players. They'd run around trying to circle strafe you and not doing a damn thing to you because they were forgetting to swing their weapons
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
Oh, it occurred to me that I never noted where we are expected to give input to FunCom for the Beta. Or are they just concerned with literal bugs. I have never had a problem giving detailed feedback during beta periods.
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven
Good points.
I will say this. In the last 3 weeks the game has improved exponentially. The sheer amount of patches I've downloaded and installed shows that the people making this game have a lot in the pipeline. They still have a few weeks so perhaps the release version will be even better.
Yes, the game right now is very buggy. Not being able to see ShadeRaven, even though I was standing right beside him (on a different town ingame server) and having no way of summoning him, was frustrating. There was an option to summon party member to instance, but it wouldnt work, stating that we were in the same instance already. This needs to go away. I spent alot of time reloading the game, due to crashouts and game freezes, but loadtimes in the game for the most part, were fine.
I was getting some framerate issues at certain places for no apparent reason. I think it was due to the debugger, but am not certain.
I will say it was the most fun I have had "playing" (when it worked) an MMO in a long time. The combat was fun, fast, and tense. It is the first game that I have really enjoyed using a 2 handed weapon, as in the past I have found the long cool down of them to be game killing; here, because you are reading the battle and trying to determine where your next attack is going, and hitting multiple targets, the 2 h weapon seemed to come alive in my virtual hands.
The game looks fantastic and is fun, I just hope they are able to fix the bugs before release.
Edit:many typos, I wrote it before my morning coffee.
Hanta & Shade I think I read something in the notes about and /instance selection command. Not sure if that is what you guys are doing or not.
I had a lot of problems trying to roll a new character last night. I kept getting BSODs or my system would lock. I deleted my game executable, patched, and set my resolution to 1024x768 and that helped.
I need to find out the slash command for reporting a bug.
The screenshot I posted contained two errors. One was the progress bar text and the other was "1243192 int_value damage". The int_value damage was falling damage from when I jumped out of that bar/ship by the harbor. Which one did they just add, progress bars for quest items or fall damage?
The game is a lot of fun and I am really drawn to it. That being said I am not confident I'm going to stick with my pre-order.
WoW chars-
Maxoxo 42 Gnome Affliction Warlock - Blackhand/Thurston 31 Human DW Fury Warrior - Blackhand (originally on Greymane)
Dohmy 70 Undead Mutilate Rogue (retired) - Nazjatar (originally on Mal'Ganis then Ysondre)
The game engine is in dire need of tuning. I have a machine at the low end of the requirements, but when I set it on Low quality settings, it looks like complete ass and only runs in the 20fps range. Plus there are times when it just pauses for 5-10 seconds, I'm guessing for texture loading or something.
There are plenty of other MMORPG engines that look way better and run much smoother on my machine, so I was pretty surprised by this level of performance. I'm sure framerates will increase a little bit once some debug codepaths are removed for retail, but it needs more than an a small incremental improvement.
I do like the gameplay so far, but I don't know if I can stomach the extremely low quality visuals. May have to wait until my next upgrade, or for XBox 360 version, before this becomes a purchase for me.
Well this game does bring more graphically to the table than any MMO currently out so it would stand to reason that if you have a lower end machine and running it on low quality it's not going to be an enjoyable experience. Who knows what they are going to do in the next couple weeks, but the game is very visually impressive. Just curious, which other MMO's are you talking about?
Xbox Live Gamer Tag: Harbinger01
PSN ID: Harbinger01
The Gaming Chronicles:
www.thegamingchronicles.blogspot.com
Oh, another oddity/bug - Pigpen logged on last night and I sent him tells, he sent me tells, but neither of us saw them. Could be related to the "instance" version, too, but that really needs to be addressed if so. Or maybe it was because he was still in the single player. Again, though, you should be able to communicate with friends on the same server.
I think hopping onto Vent and discussing the game, various tweaks to help performance, or in-game issues/insights was the best thing about last night. I know I was helped immeasurable by the guys who have been testing this before.
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven
yeah, that was a lot of fun i am tired of solo play talking to myself.
Anyone who is playing should hop on and just BS with us it is a good time.
even if i at times i wanted to mute vent to hear the cut scenes.
Pharacon wrote:
Something I noticed while playing a Barbarian is that 2h weapons are a lot less DPS on paper. I probably need to pick up a 2 hander and try killing stuff, but right now I am dual wielding two swords that are at ~21 DPS and ~20 DPS. I had a level 10 2 hander drop that was ~24 DPS. Unless the off-hand penalty is 80% damage reduction or the two 2H combos I can't swing are massive DPS boosts then 2 handed weapon use doesn't make sense over dual wielding. It would also mean they have an itemization problem. I don't want to rush to judgment without testing it out.
Maybe someone in closed beta can clear up the 2h vs. DW thing for me.
WoW chars-
Maxoxo 42 Gnome Affliction Warlock - Blackhand/Thurston 31 Human DW Fury Warrior - Blackhand (originally on Greymane)
Dohmy 70 Undead Mutilate Rogue (retired) - Nazjatar (originally on Mal'Ganis then Ysondre)
Vent is quiet enough for me that I can barely hear people when cutscenes are playing. So if ever you are talking to me and I don't respond, odds are I missed what you said because I was watching a cutscene.
Quote:
Well, it stands to reason that I wouldn't be able to enjoy the game at higher settings with a lower end machine. What isn't reasonable is that low quality settings both look and perform worse than other MMORPG engines. Both the LOTRO and Tabula Rasa engines are pretty recent, and they look significantly better, can run at a higher res, and with better framerate on my machine.
Set your resolution to 10x7 (or equivalent widescreen resolution), set the quality settings down to Low and shader model 2.0 and take a look for yourself. It's horrendous looking!
2h is substantialy less single target dps. But the advantage is the AOE damage, reach, and the potential for burst damage.
DW is goign to have higher single target dps and kill through 1on1 a bit faster and more consistnant .
the Reaver tree (2H) has a lot more CC and potential for burst then the DW tree.
let me know if you need more than that.
Pharacon wrote:
Two-handed weapon AoE... with all the beheading graphics and the like.. making me wonder if I should try some sort of warrior instead, or at least have some fun with them next. That's good stuff by the sound of it.
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven
Yeah I get what you are saying, but this game is more advanced than Lotro and Tabula Rasa by far. In my mind it makes sense that running the same settings between Lotro and AoC is going to look worse on AoC due to the fact that it requires much more to run it. Originally they said that you would need the second best computer on the market at the time of release for it to run at full settings, while they have went back and said it was mainly a joke I don't think it is far from the truth.
This is after all the "next gen" MMO.
Xbox Live Gamer Tag: Harbinger01
PSN ID: Harbinger01
The Gaming Chronicles:
www.thegamingchronicles.blogspot.com
But there is a difference between making the graphics better than WoW and making a game that is nearly unplayable on every system. I have a very solid rig, but even on medium settings my computer stutters often. There is no excuse for that. Core 2 Duo 3.0 GHz, 4GB RAM, 8800GTS. I get 60 FPS until I turn. As soon as I do that its a slide show until I stop turning again. There is no excuse for that.
Oh, and I actually am running less than medium settings. I turned off all shadows and the bloom effect.
Quote:
Graphical bang for your CPU buck is definitely one area I give full credit to Blizzard for. We have a little 4 PC LAN here and when we decided to finally take the MMO plunge (about 18 months ago), even our daughter’s little eMachine could run it well in widescreen at max res after popping in a simple nVidia 7600GT into it. LotRO is visually stunning, I think, and has much more of a real world feel to it…I honestly felt like I had stepped into Middle Earth and become part of it. However, to get that good of a look, a little better machine was required. The scenery and characters in WoW, though more cartoonish, are high quality without needing the high end machine.
I do agree, though, that AoC has taken the next step in giving us a living world feel. I am amazed and highly pleased by the amount of customization involved in creating a character’s look. There’s, what, maybe 30 sliders or settings you can go through to make the look you want, including a triangular slide bar to vary body mass, fitness! That really is fabulous stuff. I love creating distinctive characters that fit a mental image I have of them. I can spend many minutes on that alone.
If they work out the bugs and continue to give attention to the details, I’m going to find this game very hard to resist.
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven
what shader are you running?
The graphics are getting better every patch a lot of that code has not been optomized yet.
Pharacon wrote:
There are some expectations for PC games that Conan isnt living up to. (Yeah its a beta, blah blah, whatever. Its 17 days from its release date and the game is gold, so final code is printed on discs)
1. On a machine that meets the minimum system requirements, the game does not run well on the the lowest settings. Part of that is the level of detail of the game doesn't seem to scale in a way that most games do to run better. For example, at lowest settings I still see vegetation -everywhere- that is way too detailed. Mow the lawn!
2. On a machine that passes the recommended system requirements the game does not run well on the lowest settings!
I don't really believe they can get enough improvement in 2 weeks of optimizing and stripping out the debug tools to make this game run the way it -should- on their customers' computers. I'll be very very happy if they can, but I wont bet in their favor.
ThePolypusher
GH3 Stats
Some comments on first impression:
- The game is not ready for prime time. It's a good thing it's not in prime time. Scene load times were irritating and could last more than a minute. The game failed many times, usually with the video freezing. Performance wasn't good. There was a combat scene I just couldn't do, because the game kept freezing up so that the NPCs iced me before I could even move. Drove me nuts. I stopped playing and might not play at all until performance improves.
I buy PCs for "value" but my PC is fairly good. It gets a 5.0 on Vista's scale. I have a P4 Core 2 Duo, 2.0 GHz, 2 GB RAM and an 8600GT video card. I have hardline ISDN. My feeling is that the performance problem isn't with the video card performance (tho maybe the driver needs updated and is crashing.) Sometimes the machine went into what appeared to be a page swapping frenzy. Other times it felt as if the server was way overloaded.
- The game is genuinely sexy at an R-rated level. The first series of quests involve a courtesan you liberate from chains. She follows you around and "oohs" and "ahs" happily as you kick someone's butt. It's just like high school, only with you as the bully, not the 98-pound weakling. She's beautiful, and kinda offers to "meet you 'round the corner in a half an hour" (to quote the old burlesque routine.) I have not seen any jiggle physics at all, but at this historical point the brassiere definitely had not been invented and the boobies are lovely. I am enjoying that sculptural aspect of the game very much.
- The music and sound design are great! Much richer than any game I've seen previously. Acting is very good. Pseudo-foreign accents are irritating, but it's too late now and maybe I'll get used to it.
I'm on Open Beta Server 3. Seems like most of you are on server 2. I will switch if I can figure out how. Some .ini-type file? I'm playing a Stygian Demonologist named Turchuk. You?
Tykl, I have a slightly better CPU (3.2), but half the ram and the same video card (though probably half the ram on it at 256). I didn't run into any slide show issues, and I started with HIGH video settings and then bumped a few things down (like going to 2.0 shader, no bloom, and toning down shadows). Some of the inconsistancies involved in people's experiences has me scratching my head.
On the bright side, I read somewhere that there was at least a 40% improved perfomance boost with the current retail release version over the debugging Beta version, so here's hoping that will give great aid to a lot of the lower end machines in the system requirement charts.
World of Warcraft: Blackhand Server
* Sunseeker - Prot Paly (70) / * Aesildur - Holy Priest (70)
Steam Community: ShadeRaven