Elder Scrolls Online

[Cinnder]

Thanks for the review, silvers -- that pretty much confirms my fears.  Since I just started Skyrim recently, I'll stick with that till CoT comes out.

Question: when folks say it's sub and cash shop, is that pretty much like the model we had in CoX Freedom?  What do the subs get that free players don't?

[Exxar]

It's not like we had in CoX Freedom. It's like in WoW currently. Meaning you need a sub to play at all, and you can get extra cosmetic stuff in the shop.

[Eoraptor]

It's not like we had in CoX Freedom. It's like in WoW currently. Meaning you need a sub to play at all, and you can get extra cosmetic stuff in the shop.

This. you have to pay to access the game in the first place. And then you need to pay for many of the "popular" options if you don't want to spend two or three dozen hours grinding for them instead of enjoying the game. it's a clone of the way that Wow uses it's shop to dominate the MMO space by hoarding ALL the money and forcing users to feel too invested in the game to go elsewhere.

[Aggelakis]

Question: when folks say it's sub and cash shop, is that pretty much like the model we had in CoX Freedom?  What do the subs get that free players don't?

No. It's like pre-Freedom - sub - with the Freedom extras - cash shop. You HAVE to sub, and there is also a cash shop.

[Aggelakis]

it's a clone of the way that Wow uses it's shop to dominate the MMO space by hoarding ALL the money and forcing users to feel too invested in the game to go elsewhere.

Does not compute. WoW's cash shop is almost entirely vanity. Until recently, literally the only things they sold were vanity hats, pets, and mounts, and changing what your character looks like/faction/race. They're rolling out a "pay-for levels" just to combat the assholes selling PL services in their game.

[Taceus Jiwede]

I was under the impression that ESO is not being made by Bethesda.  I know the lore is there but different people making the game then the ones who made Morrowind, Oblivion, or Skyrim.  That had me turned away.  Although I don't mind paying $60 for a game and then a monthly fee, MMO's have been that way longer then they have been free to play/download.  Maybe ill try it out,  just for kicks.

[Exxar]

ESO is being published by Bethesda but developed by Zenimax Online, which is a different studio from the one which makes the classic TES games.

[joelsean1966]

At least one of my former characters will be making a comeback there.

[Thunder Glove]

The only Elder Scrolls game I've played is Morrowind (GOTY, with the expansions), but that game's world is so huge and expansive and filled with places to go and things to do that I could see that as an MMO nearly as-is.  Just add online functionality and go.

That's all they really would have needed to do, but it sounds instead like they're doing a by-the-book WoW clone, complete with the same "ten bear ass" quests.  That's disappointing.

[Taceus Jiwede]

The only Elder Scrolls game I've played is Morrowind (GOTY, with the expansions), but that game's world is so huge and expansive and filled with places to go and things to do that I could see that as an MMO nearly as-is.  Just add online functionality and go.

That's all they really would have needed to do, but it sounds instead like they're doing a by-the-book WoW clone, complete with the same "ten bear ass" quests.  That's disappointing.

I'm going to respectfully disagree with this actually.  The Elder scrolls while very awesome, were very far from being an MMO.  It would be like making the new fallouts a MMO.  They are big maps, full of lore, and full of missions and lots of different stuff to see.  But they are only there once, and the game changes as the things in the game change.  So while one player may get an awesome experience in lets say a MMO version of Skyrim.  Others would not because the NPC's are gone, buildings raided, and enemies killed across the map.  ESO is just making their game more MMO friendly.  I wouldn't say its a WoW clone, because the 10 bear quest is as old as MMO's themselves.  Pre-WoW days even.  MMO's sadly need to have easy quests that can be re-done by everyone without others screwing everyone else ability to play the game.  Personally why I was upset to hear about ESO and the rumored fallout MMO.  Too much in those great games have to change in order to become a general public friendly MMO.

[healix]

There are some pretty big names providing the voices in ESO...

[Thunder Glove]

I'm going to respectfully disagree with this actually.  The Elder scrolls while very awesome, were very far from being an MMO.  It would be like making the new fallouts a MMO.  They are big maps, full of lore, and full of missions and lots of different stuff to see.  But they are only there once, and the game changes as the things in the game change.  So while one player may get an awesome experience in lets say a MMO version of Skyrim.  Others would not because the NPC's are gone, buildings raided, and enemies killed across the map.  ESO is just making their game more MMO friendly.  I wouldn't say its a WoW clone, because the 10 bear quest is as old as MMO's themselves.  Pre-WoW days even.  MMO's sadly need to have easy quests that can be re-done by everyone without others screwing everyone else ability to play the game.  Personally why I was upset to hear about ESO and the rumored fallout MMO.  Too much in those great games have to change in order to become a general public friendly MMO.

I guess I didn't explain myself very well.  Of course you'd have to instance things so one person doesn't clear the entire map of enemies and NPCs, but there's no need to make "10 Bear Ass" quests merely because that's how other MMOs do it.  Existing ES games have enough things to do without having to resort to blatant filler like that, particularly not for a starting quest.

[Eoraptor]

There are some pretty big names providing the voices in ESO...

If there's one thing I can't stand, it's voices in MMOs. The problem is not the voices themselves... it's that the content is always evolving. that means six months or a year down the road, the road-map for any contact or quest arc might change. And game companies are likely not going to pay a voice actor to come back every few months to re-record dialogue as new episodes are added or old ones are reworked. So within the first few years you begin to get this disjointed sort of experience where some stories are chatty as hell with voice acting and background music and the like... and then suddenly... your contact has gone mute and the game just doesn't feel quite right.

Just look at Champions Online and Star Trek Online as two examples. there are swatches in both those games where you hit level fifteen and contacts you had come to associate as chatterboxxers suddenly won't give you the time of day in voice. the tutorials and the opening few levels haven't changed... so plenty of VA work in those, from some good talent to. and then, bang... where did all the chatter go?

[eabrace]

If there's one thing I can't stand, it's voices in MMOs. The problem is not the voices themselves... it's that the content is always evolving. that means six months or a year down the road, the road-map for any contact or quest arc might change. And game companies are likely not going to pay a voice actor to come back every few months to re-record dialogue as new episodes are added or old ones are reworked. So within the first few years you begin to get this disjointed sort of experience where some stories are chatty as hell with voice acting and background music and the like... and then suddenly... your contact has gone mute and the game just doesn't feel quite right.

They've sort of addressed that issue with ESO.  During earlier phases of beta, it was quite apparent that much of the dialogue had not yet been recorded, and yet, the contacts were still speaking.  They're using text to speech software to provide voices where they haven't finished the recordings.

Granted, the jump between recorded voice actor and generated voice can be pretty obvious sometimes, but it's a little less jarring than having the game go mute all of a sudden.

[Felderburg]

Individuality:
Hard to say at my low level how much variability there will be in looks.  But like most games,  equipment dictates appearance.
I really miss my CoH character creater.

There's an article about an infographic that says characters have some ridiculously high number of variations: http://www.gamespot.com/articles/the-elder-scrolls-online-has-5-0952187-10-58-possible-character-variations/1100-6418770/

I had issues getting a Gamespot account, so I couldn't post in the comments a question: Body variation is nice, but what about costumes? City of Heroes, for example, had a similar ridiculously high number of costume variations, and you never saw duplicates in that game.

[eabrace]

"Costume" is based primarily on gear equipped. I don't know if they were counting that as part of character variation.

[Eoraptor]

Hopefully they will handle it like Star Trek Online does... where gear equipped CAN alter a toon's appearance, but you have the option to turn part of all of the visuals off to let your custom crafted garb shine through. It seems a good balance between the two options.

[Aggelakis]

If gear's not completely separate from costuming like City's was, I vastly prefer the new version of gear, where you have "gear slots" where you put the ugly leveling-up stuff, and "costume slots" where you put the cool looking stuff. If you have something in a costume slot, it overrides the visuals of the gear. If you don't have anything in a costume slot, it defaults to the gear slot's look.

I also really like the concept of "gear dye" but so many games do it wrong. Too many you have to have an individual pot of dye for every single piece ever. Instead, I like Guild Wars 2's version where you find a pot of dye and use it to apply it to your pallet...and you have that available forever, to use as often (or as little) as you like.

^ more games need to do both of the above. (even better to do it like City, but that'll never happen)

[healix]

[SuckerPunch]

Any old Titan-ites playing this? It'd be fun to team up with old COH folks.