Guild Wars 2

I thought about giving ESO a try but after watching Angry Joe’s in depth review of the game, it doesn’t seem appealing at all unless they have fixed the majority of the issues he brings up…

Does anyone know how Tera Online is these days? I never played it, I heard it had many issues at launch but it seems they’re still supporting the game with patches and updates and it looks intriguing and different…

The same reasons why games like Dark Souls are a hit. It encourages you to become better, to be more skilled at the game, play your character better and strengthen your character… It makes those feats actually matter in a game that has “some” level of punishment for death and failure alongside challenging content… Accomplishing challenging circumstances is more rewarding then steam rolling through a streamlined theme park where failure has no penalty. Most game’s now adays have difficulty settings or mods… but MMORPG’s you are locked into the developers vision… and it seems most mmorpg developers these days are way too eager to cater to the lowest skilled gamers.

I enjoy pve and pvp equally… But I’m looking for a challenging and immersive pve experience that few, if any MMORPG’s these days can provide.

I heard ESO is pretty bad game; not sure if that’s changed from launch.
Dark Falls Unholy Wars seems to be more geared for a hardcore PVP experience.
FF14 and Rift are just another WoW clone.

You make some good points, but a couple things to note… Older MMORPG’s were much more difficult, relentless and brutal then the ones of today… Yes I am better at these types of games then I was back then but the older games did no hand holding, offered little direction and were extremely unforgiving… Do I want to go back to that? Not exactly… I consider myself a balanced gamer, neither on the uber casual side or uber hardcore side… But it would be nice to see a game like Guild Wars 2 offer a more balanced approach… You can’t please everybody, but mmorpg’s are far too leaned to appeasing a niche of players who are essentially horrible at games and don’t like thinking or being challenged… They reserve challenge only for high level raids and pvp contained often in closed arenas… the rest of the content becomes trivial and mundane.

I’m not looking to go back to un-geared corpse runs, losing all your gear and a huge chunk of experience when I die against harsh odds.. But it would be nice to feel some sense of danger when exploring the world and have an actual reason to avoid death and failure… and steer clear of dangerous regions until I am confident and strong enough. I’m also bored of the “follow a line to point A on your map” for any quest, destination and events to area’s you’ve not even visited yet… No exploration, research or even paying attention is required to progress at any tier.

Sure there are games like Darkfall Unholy Wars, but that’s on the opposite end of the spectrum… My main point is I’d be a lot more interested in Guild Wars 2 if they tried a more balanced approach throughout more areas of the game…

I love the style of this game and I enjoy the aspects that sets it apart from other mmorpg’s… most of which don’t appeal to me at all anymore.

But I am finding one glaring aspect of the game that it shares with most mainstream mmo’s these days… it seems too brainless and easy. Now I’m in no means a hardcore gamer with a desperate need for punishment and pain at every corner; I consider myself a balanced gamer but I am finding nearly all mmorpg’s including GW2 error far toward the casual side of gaming.

I miss oldschool mmorpg’s where there was a sense of awe, dread, danger and adventure. UO, EQ and FF11 for instance… You had to prepare and plan for your journey and failure actually had an impact; such as experience loss or losing valuable equipment. On top of which you’d have corpse runs or be sent back a fair distance.

With Guild Wars 2 I feel like I’m just running around staring at the mini map, blindly charging through areas and quests with no concern for the surrounding environment and no concern for the lack of danger and challenge. Just charge full speed ahead to win… This is a bit disappointing since Guild Wars 2 does a lot to set itself apart then most mainstream mmorpg’s on the market today, yet it still adopts their flaws of streamlined hand holding, every step of the way… Dying or failure has no impact and all you do is re-spawn a few meters away without any penalty and continue to steam roll through content without any need for strategy and preparation…

I guess WoW has ruined this generation of mmorpg’s given it’s population numbers and that it caters primary to the ADHD era of gaming that caters to the hyper casual audience and hands you everything on a silver platter without consequence or effort.

I guess there are no alternate servers or private servers that cater to a more hardcore audience? At least with non-mmorpg’s you can always find mods to boost immersion or challenge… with mmo’s your at the whim of the developers who seem to do everything possible to lure and keep the most casual or simple gamers playing.

One thing, do your opponents actually heal when you die? During my first story line quest at level 10, I actually got swarmed and died… Re-started at the check point, ran back and saw the boss was still at half health so I defeated him easily… Not only did I die and not get any type of punishment, but my opponents seem to be crippled fro,m my first encounter… Is this the normal thing with most story line quests? If that’s the case I’ll likely not be continuing with the game.

I guess these days it’s hard to find any AAA mmorpg that isn’t painfully casual/easy where the bulk of the content is steam rolled through fairly effortlessly and there is no consequence to dieing or careless play… I like the style of this game but I guess I’m left nostalgic for the days of UO, EQ and FF11, where you always felt a sense of dread and risk exploring and had to stay on your toes… These days I feel like I can just blindly cruise around in any mmorpg because they are so streamlined and hand holding. Makes accomplishing feats seem rather mundane and trivial.

I just hit level 7, getting a good grasp on mechanics but nothing has come close to challenging me or testing my brain so far… Just being stream-lined through cake walk events and quests… Does it get a bit more meaty and challenging beyond level 10?

I find mmorpg’s spend too long holding your hand these days.