Review of Ryzom posted to my guild of 200+

[phoenyx]

Some of you will hate me for this. Nevrax might choose to delete this thread. I'm sorry, but it has to be said. I'm not trying to put anyone down for liking this game. I'm trying to help Nevrax understand where they are falling short and what needs to be fixed to make this game succeed. I'd like to come back to this game in a half a year and see it actually fun and playable. (Assuming the rumors are untrue about deleting chars if you cancel your account. If Nevrax takes that unwise course they are *really* shooting themselves in the foot.)

As a preface to this review, I've posted it internally to my multi-gaming guild (of 5 years) that has approx 230 active members. I'm literally the only person in the entire guild who even bothered to check out this game. That's how little buzz this game has generated (or indicative of how much bad word of mouth spread from the betas). There are a lot of guilds out there, large and small, and in many of them, at least one person has probably tried this game. Like me, they ALL report internally their impressions of the game. Word of mouth among guildmates is the number one factor in determining the success of an MMOG. A developer/publisher has to get it right by open beta these days, because most of the scouts are IN your open betas. If you go to retail launch with major problems that were clearly identified in open beta, you have a very rough road ahead of you.

Well, here ya go. Candid feedback from a veteran MMOGer who's played pretty much all the MMOGs. I daresay this is typical of the internal word of mouth being circulated among most MMOG-based guilds. I hope you can do something constructive with it because this game really does have some innovative and promising aspects.

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In a word, don't bother. It's cool at first but Nevrax got it wrong with several very basic gameplay factors. The worst offense is that your ability to PvE is based on your gear, and you cannot buy decent gear from NPC vendors. All the decent, actually usable gear *must* be crafted. The next worse offense is that the decay time on your gear is insanely fast. Players in teams, fighting mobs that yeild appropriate exp for the group members, routinely wear down their weapons and armor in a day or two at most. Some players even go through two weapons in one evening of playing.

To exacerbate the above issues, foraging for the materials needed to make the decent crafted gear is fairly time-intensive. Interesting, even fun at first, but too time intensive for the yeild. It can take 2-3 hours to forage the 112 pieces of material needed to make a set of good heavy armor, for instance. You can sell that set at level 50 for roughly 250,000 to 300,000. In that same amount of time, you could be hunting and leveling your fighting/magic skills, having fun and thrills, and make the same amount of money or more off the mob loot drops. The net result is that there's no serious incentive to craft for most players, so there's not enough crafted gear to outfit all the players who'd rather hunt and not deal with crafting. Even in guilds with dedicated crafters and lots of people foraging to help the crafters make gear faster, the crafters can barely keep up with the demand. You see the regional chat filled with people asking for a piece of gear at a certain level and you seen almost no responses. The few crafters actually advertising gear to sell rarely have anything that is germane to yourself.

This game is, on some levels, Horizons all over again. Way too crafting-centric. When will developers understand that it's a Bad Idea to make crafted gear mandatory for just exploring and hunting? World of Warcraft and Anarchy Online, by contrast have two of the best crafting systems I've ever seen. In those games, crafting is not mandatory... You can do just fine with the gear you get from mob drops or as mission/quest rewards. In those games, crafting either enhances the gear you already own, somehow, or it provides utility skills that are fun and neat and useful situationally.

In AO, for instance, a crafter would be needed to put together your implants for you, or to modify your weapon for better damage output, or to put together quested materials into an armor piece for you that was uber armor. But in all these cases, the crafter did not run around getting all these parts. You brought the parts to the crafter, he put them together for you in a matter of minutes, and then you tipped the guy for helping you. And it was not time-consuming/boring to get those parts together. In the case of implants, you just bought the parts from vending machines. In the case of the more uber armor, you acquired the parts while hunting mobs (fun) or solving a tough, interesting quest (fun). In other words, you acquired the parts you needed while questing or hunting. Not staring at a resource node on the ground, pulling the slot machine handle while you slowly accumulate 0-4 resources with each attempt.

In WoW, most of the crafted items are supplemental goodies that are not mandatory for gameplay. Potions are arguably mandatory according some folks, but IMO they're not really. You can do just fine without potions. Engineering toys are situationally useful and fun in PvP. But they're not mandatory. Armor/weapon crafting can enhance a weapon you already have. Or they can build weaps/armor that are better than most of what drops from mobs/missions, but not so much better that they become "must-have" items just to play the game.

Anyway, with a superb game like WoW due out very soon, don't bother with Ryzom unless you're really bored and just want to see something different for a "free" month. You won't want to actually subscribe after the free month is over. Which is a shame, because the game is beautiful and could be so much better. The game designers just really have wrong ideas about very basic stuff. Plus the game was released too early, like most MMOGs (except WoW), and there's very little content other than killing mobs and foraging and crafting. No end game. Not even any quests. Yes yes, some of this is "coming soon" but again, when will developers and publishers learn that they shoot themselves in the foot by releasing a game too early? Players always chew through your newbie/lowbie content with amazing speed. Again, Blizzard has done an amazing job with WoW in this regard. There is more diverse and content ready and polished in closed beta than most MMOGs have a year after retail launch.

[cerest]

I'm sorry that the game didn't live up to your WOW expectations. I hope you do come back sometime soon though and give us another chance.

[phoenyx]

I'm sorry that the game didn't live up to your WOW expectations. I hope you do come back sometime soon though and give us another chance.

Thanks, Cerest. I hope to be able to do just that maybe 6 months down the road. AO was riddled by technical problems and balance issues at launch, for example, but 12-18 months later became a very solid and deep and enjoyable game. I hope that you guys can likewise flesh this game out and address some of the basic gameplay issues.

I also hope that the rumors aren't true and that when I try again in half a year my characters will still be there. If not.... Well, let's say that's another thing that games like DAoC and AO have done right. You can go back anytime and pick up where you left off. I've been in and out of AO several times now, for 3-4 months at a time. All because I never "lose" any work I've put in there.

[raynes]

I'm sorry that the game didn't live up to your WOW expectations. I hope you do come back sometime soon though and give us another chance.

LOL I've played WoW and I can tell you first hand it's not that spectacular. It is the same thing that you can find in most other MMO's. If you don't want something new and different, you will love WoW. If you want something new, your going to think WoW is really nothing special.

[Starla]

Is there a script for writing these reveiws? Every review of any new MMO game I've ever read by a guild or Uber Longtime MMO player always reads the same. Don't buy blah blah game because no contenet, bugs left over from beta, must craft own stuff, blah blah blah. According to all the these "reviews" no game will ever meet your expectations. Except of course for some other game not yet out that your playing in beta for free. My guess is all these reviews are written by habitual beta testers that dont want whatever free game they are beta testing to go to retail. As soon as it does, they slam it and move on to the next "free" beta game out on the market.

What is this post supposed to accomplish? Are you expecting Nevarax to read it, pull it off the market and put it back into beta until it meets your expectations?

Btw you conviently left out the name of your 200+ guild and their website address.

[raynes]

And just in case anyone really wants to know the truth about WoW, read this review:

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/setv ... gameID/15/

It does a great job of describing the game without the hype.

[wicker]

Your loss.

Ryzom is the best MMO I've ever played. WoW isn't that good at all. Boring and bland graphics.

[phoenyx]

I don't want this to devolve into a rah-rah thread for other games. That's not my intent. But to address the comment about WoW two posts above...

No, there's nothing really new or innovative in WoW. But what is there is polished and near-perfect gameplay in the genre. They took the best aspects of every MMOG to date and rolled it into one game. Unlike Ryzom, it's the kind of game you log into at first and go: "eh... so what?" After a week of playing, though, you are in awe of the smooth gameplay, the fun factor, and the sheer variety of things to do. Believe me, it's not the Blizzard name that is generating the buzz about WoW - its the closed beta testers who have been in there for months and their word of mouth reports to guildies. My guild had roughly 20 people sharing about 4 CB accounts, and to a person they were all rabid fanbois in short order.

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As for the comment about game hoppers and the "next free game," it's not like that either. Case in point: Everquest 2. Amazing screenshots. Amazing trailers. Incredibly lush graphics, the amazing innovation of lots of voiceover interaction with NPCs, etc. etc. Just looks incredible, right? The next big thing from the big success story of MMOG developers, right?

EQ2 is bunk. Looks great. Horrible gameplay that is really no better or deeper than the first EQ. Abysmal quests. Monster gaming rigs choke on it; I have no clue how the average gamer will even play the thing.

[cerest]

This is why there is chocolate and vanilla. Everyone has different tastes and is entitled to their own opinion.

[phoenyx]

What is this post supposed to accomplish? Are you expecting Nevarax to read it, pull it off the market and put it back into beta until it meets your expectations?

Btw you conviently left out the name of your 200+ guild and their website address.

This post is user feedback for Nevrax. Detailed reasons why I won't be subscribing after the free month is out, with the hopes that they will eventually be able to address these issues, provided they notice a trend similar to mine. Sincere attempt to help better a game that has potential.

As for my guild, we're fairly well-known in PvP circles, being a PvP-centric guild of mature players. We were voted the most influential guild on AC2 Darktide, on AC2 Insider magazine. Formed back in the early days of AC1.

The Ancient Order - TAO
http://theancientorder.com