Review the Neverwinter MMO for me!

[Draeth Darkstar]

So, I'm sure there are a few (hundred) reviews of the Neverwinter beta test out there in the wild internet, but I don't care what those people think, I care what you people think. So tell me, as former City players, what do those of you who've played it think of the game? What makes it good and what irritates you about it? Why would I, as an MMO vet. and also former player of COX, want to play this new title in a sea of other up-and-coming MMORPGs?

[Stormy Weathermaker]

I'm unsure as  to what your play style is, so I'm not really able to tell you if you would like it.  What I can tell you is what I've gotten out of the game thus far.  Now, keep in mind, I've never played D&D in any form, but the storyline seems to be pretty good (if you're into storylines), graphics seem pretty good, movement is different than CoH, but not that bad to get used to.  The movement keys, in my opinion, is much better than CO or DCUO.  I tried both those games and the movement method drove me batty to the point where I said "forget this!" and uninstalled them.  If you're a D&D fan, all I can tell you is what I read, which is the devs have tried to pull lore in from the D&D pnp version into the MMO.  Because I've never played D&D, I'm not sure as to how well they pulled that off. 

As to what's irritating about it?  Since I'm more a casual player, I can't really say that I found anything that irritated me that bad about it.  Not any more irritating than saving Fusionette's butt every time I turned around in Faultline 

The only suggestion I can make is try the Open Beta and check it out and form your own opinion 

Open Beta is coming on Tuesday, April 30th

[Maressa]

So even though I'm one of those reviewers out there on the internet I thought I'd put in my two cents.

If you're used to tab targeting it might be a bit frustrating at the start as you use your mouse for all your targeting as well as two of your attacks. Personally I find the set up for the keys a bit annoying as they are, but I understand that its designed so you have one hand on the mouse and one hand on the keyboard at all times. Graphically its very similar to Champions. Your appearance is based on your armor which while a fantasy MMO industry standard I think people are growing tired of it. There is however a town clothes slot separate from your armor which is fantastic news for rpers. Once I got into the combat the targeting issues seemed to be less of an issue for me. I just need to remember that looking at the bad guy =/= targeting the bad guy. But I do that in every game.

Overall, while it seems to be a decent enough game, for me it boils down to Champions/STO Fantasy version. I'm sure I'll continue playing off and on for some time to come, but in the end if I need the hard drive space for another game (like ESO) I imagine it will be the first to go much as Tera was so I could install Neverwinter.

If I were to rate  it I'd give it a 6/10. It doesn't have much of anything new or innovative in it but at the same time mixing D&D and the player created content of the Foundry is genius.

[SeaLily]

I think Neverwinter is a lot of fun!  I enjoyed the beta pretty heartily and I'm excited to play it now that everyone has access.

However, there's been some launch issues, which you can see in my amazing thrill-packed video documentary here.

[SerialBeggar]

I think Neverwinter is a lot of fun!  I enjoyed the beta pretty heartily and I'm excited to play it now that everyone has access.

However, there's been some launch issues, which you can see in my amazing thrill-packed video documentary here.

Your Queue Position advanced to 6603, then dropped back to 34985?    What happened?  Did you leave the queue for a pee break?

[Taceus Jiwede]

I think Neverwinter is a lot of fun!  I enjoyed the beta pretty heartily and I'm excited to play it now that everyone has access.

However, there's been some launch issues, which you can see in my amazing thrill-packed video documentary here.

I was in the closed beta.  I tried to log in today and the patcher wouldnt work.  Spent 4-5 hours trying to get that working.

However the game is a lot fun to the OP.  First action MMO I actually enjoyed playing.  The Control Wizard is a lot of fun, not unlike controllers, the CC requires some juggling.  It is much shorter but you do a little more damage.  I got to 20 before the open beta started so I dont know if I lost my character or not.  But by 20 already I was able to fully juggle and combo powers together.  Was a ton of fun!

If anyone is playing on Beheader lemme know!

[Tenzhi]

Having fun with it so far.  Needs an archer, and I'm hoping they put Dragonborn in, and 2 character slots makes me sad.

[Minotaur]

Finding the controls difficult to get used to, no mouseover or tab targeting, F to collect stuff other than money off the ground.

WASD to move, no turns on the KB and mouse movement to turn. QER activate powers although you can reprogram that.

It has a good 4th ed D&D feel and is quite fun, but I don't think I'll play too much.

[Mistress Urd]

Finding the controls difficult to get used to, no mouseover or tab targeting, F to collect stuff other than money off the ground.

WASD to move, no turns on the KB and mouse movement to turn. QER activate powers although you can reprogram that.

It has a good 4th ed D&D feel and is quite fun, but I don't think I'll play too much.

That was a big problem for me too. You would think after all this time they would have better player controls. 
I guess CoH spoiled me.

[Illusionss]

Well, I got in tonight and just as people were discussing their guild full of CoXers in zone chat and how they were all having fun together, I could not figure out how to reply or send a tell so I could beg for an invite.    unhappiness!

This is going to take some getting used to, but I will tinker with it and see how it goes. Still shank's-mare all over the place.... but it at least seems playable so I am not dismissing it out of hand. Plus I get at least some choice in how my character looks, which for me is paramount.

its better so far than Marvel Heroes, anyways.

[Captain Electric]

its better so far than Marvel Heroes, anyways.

Heck, I'm the guy defending Marvel Heroes in the thread next door, and even I agree with you there. Neverwinter is a damn fun game. I don't even like fantasy MMOs and I'm hooked.

Well, l should clarify, once you get used to the controls, it's a damn fun game. The whole game is a mess of non-intuitive spaghetti for the first thirty minutes or so. You know all of those fine, traditional MMO conventions that've been forming over the past 15 years? Neverwinter basically sets all of them on fire and starts all over. You know those movies where the hero gets hold of some weird alien bio-weapon-gun and sticks his whole arm in it and it's drooling all over him and he's like, "EWWW!!! What the hell?" And then a few minutes later he's a space cowboy on steroids? Yeah. It's kind of like that. 

Well, but fantasy.

[Illusionss]

How can I get my cursor to appear on top of my screen all the time?! This is frustrating! The only time I see my cursor is when I have ESC toggled. Not being able to direct my cursor sucks! I cant check my email, even.

I am even running in windowed mode, and I still cant see my cursor unless Im looking at my options [Esc]. If I could solve this one thing, the game would become much more enjoyable.

Level 7 so far. One thing I do like is that they give you health inspirations, and if you are me you always need those.

[Aggelakis]

How can I get my cursor to appear on top of my screen all the time?! This is frustrating! The only time I see my cursor is when I have ESC toggled. Not being able to direct my cursor sucks! I cant check my email, even.

I am even running in windowed mode, and I still cant see my cursor unless Im looking at my options [Esc]. If I could solve this one thing, the game would become much more enjoyable.

Your cursor is the circle in the center of the screen. It is attached, FPS-style, to your camera (aka mouselook). There is no way to separate it permanently. Tapping alt will temporary take you out of mouselook and allow you to click on things on your screen. You can't attack while doing this, so don't do it in the middle of combat or you'll die *embarrassed look*. Tapping alt again will reinstate FPS-style mouselook.

[Captain Electric]

This is one of the initially non-intuitive aspects of the game I allude to above. After a night of playing you'll be zipping in and out of "alt mode" like it's all completely natural. A lot of the game is like that. It feels weird, then something clicks and you go, "Oh, OK." And you realize (A) they've streamlined some things to make a more natural-feeling MMO, and (B) it feels totally unnatural at first because you're a human and humans have habits.

The only sticking point for me is, I still wish that we had SOME amount of in/out zoom in combat mode, but I understand there's design reasons behind it and that's a whole other discussion. Me and a lot of other people begged for a compromise all throughout closed beta, like a short axis of zoom at least, so your camera wouldn't be bouncing all over the walls as badly in dungeons. It looks like that's not going to happen and I'll just have to get over it. Although someone did mention an editable .ini file last night in CoX chat...

[Minotaur]

Well, I got in tonight and just as people were discussing their guild full of CoXers in zone chat and how they were all having fun together, I could not figure out how to reply or send a tell so I could beg for an invite.    unhappiness!

This is going to take some getting used to, but I will tinker with it and see how it goes. Still shank's-mare all over the place.... but it at least seems playable so I am not dismissing it out of hand. Plus I get at least some choice in how my character looks, which for me is paramount.

its better so far than Marvel Heroes, anyways.

I believe that unless you're a founder, you have to get to a certain level (15?) to be able to join chat channels and send tells.

[General Idiot]

If it's anything like Cryptic's other two games, that's their effort at preventing spammers. In CO/STO you can buy a single zen off the ingame exchange and that'll disable it immediately, I think. I'd imagine it's the same in Neverwinter.

[Stormy Weathermaker]

I believe that unless you're a founder, you have to get to a certain level (15?) to be able to join chat channels and send tells.

I'm not sure about chat channels, but you do not need to be a founder in order to send tells.  you should be able to right click on name and send a private message.  I haven't tried to join chat channels, but I can send tells without issue and not a  founder.

[Candie Firestar]

How can I get my cursor to appear on top of my screen all the time?! This is frustrating! The only time I see my cursor is when I have ESC toggled. Not being able to direct my cursor sucks! I cant check my email, even.

I am even running in windowed mode, and I still cant see my cursor unless Im looking at my options [Esc]. If I could solve this one thing, the game would become much more enjoyable.

Press the ALT key to get your cursor.  This suspends game mode to do things you need to using your mouse cursor.

[Dollhouse]

I'be been playing a lot of Defiance, so I can probably get used to the non-MMO-standard interface pretty easily. Hell, I've never really liked traditional MMO-style combat anyway! The biggest obstacle to me for Neverwinter is that it's high fantasy. That's a gaming genre that simply holds very little interest for me. I log on to GW1 every now and then, and that's it, really. Well, okay, and Torchlight... 

[Illusionss]

Me too, Doll. Fantasy is boring to me - at least as an MMO, and the look of this game is suprisingly dated; IMO CoX had better graphics than this. But.... its playable, so I will probably pootle around with it for a while.

THanks everyone for cursor tips, I do find it incredibly stupid and immersion-breaking that I have to stop everything and hit the alt key to get non-combat stuff done. But its still better than Marvel Heroes, so......

Since this is still officially Beta, I hope they dont wipe our characters once Live hits. I WILL be upset if they do that.