About ten months ago I begun playing Lotro after many years playing other MMORPGs and after a recent refresh of Tolkien's works. This is my personal view on the ups and downs with Lotro, honest and fair. People may disagree and I honour that, hopefully you allow me my opinions.
For reference, see A Theory of Fun for my touchstone on games: a great game must be entertaining, rewarding, challenging, and surprising; time-sinks are OK but only if they fulfil any of those criteria.
APPEARANCE
My very first impression of Lotro was...great. The worlds score high, they are varied and detailed, and for an explorer like me they will last a while, indeed. The worlds also provide a feeling very close to how I imagined Tolkien's fictional world already in the '70-ies, before any movie had twisted my mind.
However, in the end of the day Lotro is aged. You should not look too closely at anything if you want to retain your illusion about them. Actually, not much, if anything, stand a closer look as the bitmaps were aged and dull already when Lotro was new. And sadly, a distant look is impossible as the graphics engine cuts off details not too far away (GeForce GTX 570 4MB and options at "ultra high").
The developers deserve a special note of praise for the many hidden gems they have added at the most unexpected places, things and/or locations that fill no purpose for quests or alike, but they just are. An example is the Mess Hall in Bree. For a role-player or an explorer those gems are just awesome; quest-bums look at them curiously; but I guess power-levellers just sneeze at them as road-blockers. Me? I love them
Animations and visual effects range from okay to excellent. However, the walking animation for some races (Man indeed) could be improved. Some are so bad that it looks like grown up people walking with diapers?
Maps and the Radar are unacceptable. Many centuries ago people begun using and demanding detailed maps; but it seems that the devs wrongly interpreted "parchment" as fussy and undetailed. I can seldom see for sure whether a possible passage through the wilderness is open or blocked; how do I navigate through Agamaur?; or how do I find my way around in Nan Wathren! And those were just a few examples of many. The few updated maps are slightly better but still not detailed enough to be useful, and their colours look more cartoonish.
Why the radar does not rotate with the character movements is beyond me, but that is not a show-stopper. Worse is its very narrow view which would be acceptable if either the map or the radar had zooming, but Lotro has neither. Zoomable maps existed long before Lotro was developed. Devs, shape up!
Music-and-sound keeps a very high standard, some music snippets are superb. Occasionally, at some locations the repetitive loops soon turn annoying or worse; obviously somebody did not want me to stay too long at some places. And some music is just awful, in Angmar for example. And I would not hesitate a split second to kick the Minstrel Trainer out of Tinnudir and burn his flute, if I could. Luckily, the bad exceptions are few and far apart, still they are worth fixing I think.
Worth an awful lot of praise is Lotro's support for player musicians, I know no other game which comes even remotely close. The best players give remarkable performances. Many many credits to both Lotro and to some musicians. Wanted improvement: Add an option "allow player music to mute ambient music".
Character appearance is another story though; both their looks as well as tweaking options fall short. Yes, I have some such options but games much older than Lotro have ten-folds more and better, and they also provide more natural looks and better gestures.
On the other hand, outfits and gears are much varied and the outfitting panel is great. However, the Ctrl-D to preview items is unacceptable; so many other games have large, nice, rotate-and-zoom-able views just at my fingertip, why not Lotro?
NPC appearances is another sad story. While other games have great-looking NPCs with a rich variation in looks, clothing and gear, what do I find in Lotro? Dull bitmap faces glued over a bulb! Come on, give them realistic and varied 3-dimensional faces, and equip them with more variation. Now even the simplest Mobs look better than NPCs do.
So ... even though the worlds are great, rich, and varied, I cannot but compare with other games and see that Lotro's graphics technology is aged with dull bitmaps making whatever I look closer at gloomy and blunt. Maps and the radar have helpful icons and filters but still fail badly in usefulness. My first weow-feeling has indeed faded, though it is not dead.
GAME-PLAY
Free-to-play? I quickly realized that my play style required a subscription; and I have since gathered that I am not alone. I don't mind this as long as it's price-worthy, but is it?
The Lotro Store is good, but even as a long-term VIP I find myself buying stuff that most VIPs think should be included. This is voluntarily of course, but the 500 TPs per month are insufficient, insultingly poor; pre-paid subscriptions should probably have 50-90% rebate on stuff that preferably should be included in VIP. No, generally speaking and for a subscribed player, Lotro feels the opposite to "rewarding". Turbine has failed to handle subscription versus F2P nicely; the benefits are there but weak.
The Epic storyline is great, continued throughout the volumes and their books. Clearly the developers have done their Tolkien classes with good grades; they seem to be devoted fans, down to tiny details only other Tolkien-nerds realize. Of course they must invent stories to flesh out a large game, stories that fork off from and run in parallel with the path of the Fellowship, and also cross paths here and there for the fun of it, but not too much. A delicate balance indeed, but I think the mix of Tolkien and Turbine is executed excellently.
The "starter-areas" are great, both edutaining and with good story-lines, long enough to set up the new character and short enough even for character/class-hoarders like me to run through once in a while.
However, quite soon after my first character was released into the real worlds the question-marks were piling up and confusion applied. Quests took me in all directions; where to go?, what to do?, and what to skip? Deeds are starting every new thing I touched; which to complete?, which to skip?, and which are most important for my class? I am undecided on this one, having many options is great but back then I felt it was too much too early.
Levelling is no problem in Lotro, I reached level 20 and 30 in a few days each but then it slowed down somewhat (mainly due to more time-sinks in planning, fixing gears, and more travelling). I notice that speed-grinders have no problems whatsoever.
However, players like me, who love to do-it-all and who also love challenging game-play, we are out-levelling quests and I often wish for an option to temporarily turn off XP. (However, this is an issue in almost all content-rich games for my player-type, and I have yet not seen it addressed anywhere.)
At about level 20 my characters were called both to The Lone-lands and to The North Downs. This is great as I can align/role-play the characters in one direction or the other. But it is also confusing as in "where to go?" since the Epic story-line goes in just one direction, to The Lone-lands. This is repeated at level 30 with Evendim and The Trollshaws, but now the Epic storyline goes to The North Downs. This is repeated at level 40, etc. Each time I still have many quests and deeds of the recent regions just half completed, not to speak of reputation with factions. The horse commutes endlessly between the many regions in order to complete required and/or interesting content.
That long-distance travelling, is it really a problem? That depends on who you ask? Role-players probably hate it as it was impossible at the time; even Gandalf, on the swiftest horse ever, had to ride for days to get anywhere. No, this is not a show-stopper, but it ain't fun.
I like the challenge in doing quests just at the edge of my capacity, but then I must also skip large chunks of quests and select only those that are challenging and interesting. But since I also love to do-it-all (complete all available quests) I have to complete the remainders when they are way below my level. Not fun.
Side-quests: Their negligible stories ignored ... why are so many of them chained and/or have unrelated prerequisites? Which quests have I missed simply because I have missed a prerequisite somewhere? Those things are annoying, remnants of an old fashioned quest building era.
Silly riding to and fro is another joy-killer. I have spoken with veteran players who prefer skirmish-levelling but avoid quests because of all the time wasted on a horse. Longer rides are OK only when a fair chunk of quests at fitting levels are available at the destination. Silly-riding to and fro with a nonsense message adds neither challenge nor fun.
Fellowship is required for many quests, often unexpectedly in the middle or at the end of a quest chain. That requirement effectively rules out the very large group of players who prefer playing solo or paired with their best friend. It is really hard to suddenly find a group right then and there, and I hate being forced to a random group after a rough day at work, or when I just want to chill on my own. Lotro is known among gamers for this obstacle: we never know when to become blocked on a fellowship-quest. --- Some kinships are of course great but I understand that most players are not that lucky, but even if they are, they must wait a day or so for help with "their" quest.
Fellowship requirement is absolutely OK for repeatable Instances, Raids or Skirmishes but should not suddenly/unexpectedly show up in a quest chain. Players should not have to lookup fan sites in advance to figure out if they can complete a certain chain.
The proper solution is of course scalable encounters: the stronger the fellowship the tougher ads spawn in seamlessly to the challenge. When players join or leave the fellowship the strength of the group is recalculated and within seconds foes spawn in or are weakened. Turbine has implemented a variation of that kind in the skirmish-system so the devs are certainly not unfamiliar with the maths and the technology.
Yes, I know about the Social window and its search-for-group feature. But, of all players who instantly jump to that suggestion, almost none can answer "yes" to the simple question "have you used it the recent 10 days?" Thence, it exists, but it is not used enough to gather the necessary momentum to become helpful ..etc. A Catch 22 kind of thing.
Deeds and Virtues are another dreadful joy-killer. The idea is great---I can create a "unique" character---but it is badly implemented. Most virtues require a few slayer deeds plus a fair chunk of quests from each region. The result is that most virtue-deeds must be completed by killing/doing stuff way way way below my level, at known and thus camped deed-harvest locations. How fun is that you think? Not fun at all but a pain in my a...behind! Traumatizing!
Just think about this: completing 75 quests in The Shire gives Innocence+1; but...being any race but Hobbit and realizing that Innocence is a must-have for my class means completing no less than 75 level 5-12 quests Many other virtue-deeds require mindless slaughter of several hundreds of certain mobs, unrelated to quests or storyline, and some which exist only at certain locations and also then in small numbers (as if the devs don't know spawn rates and such stuff). Sorry, all that cr#p is rooted in an obsolete game-methodology which was aged already when Lotro was developed. This is not fun nor challenging, just tiresome.
Storage Capacity: Lotro has a very limited storage. True, there are other games with similarly low capacity but they are usually less "item-rich" so the limitations do not hurt as much. Maximum is 5 bags á 15 slots. Period! Lotro has about one vault per region; its upper limit was recently improved but I must buy the extra capacity in chunks of 15 for precious TP, both for the shared vault as well as per character. Better storage should really be free or much much cheaper for long-term VIP.
The other day a Turbine representative announced a 6th bag. Remember though, all his talk about technology and databases is just bull. Of course these things take DB-space, but negligible compared to other things in an MMO. The only dilemma Turbine has is the amount of F2P versus VIPs; the latter group pay regularly and the former not at all or sparsely, but VIP get a bad return on investment. Doubling the bag and vault sizes for active VIPs is one solution, but there are other ways ... just don't treat adult players with more bull, please.
Especially the crafting oriented players are severely hampered. Why is there no "workbox" similar to the recently improved "wallet" where I can stash my ingredients? Solve that and much of the storage complaints would be silenced.
In my personal opinion, how does Lotro score this far?
Entertaining? Yes and no. Tolkien fans probably love (or hate) it, personally I like Turbine's interpretation of Tolkien's work. Explorers (such as me) and role-players (which I enjoy but am not devoted to) probably enjoy Lotro as much as any similar game. For all other player types the answer is not as simple because Lotro's age and long teeth stand out too much. The virtue-deed system stinks badly, the quest system is rusty and aged, and there are many more things that subtract from my potential fun. The "entertaining" factor could be much much improved with just a few simple tweaks (RoI comes to mind writing this, and then not the expansion).
Rewarding? Quest rewards are fairly good, the tight-fisted player may come a long way without problems. Monetary there is nothing to complain about. However, reputation items often have too a low level, once you have gained enough reputation with the faction they are already out-levelled. Some quests with great rewards require fellowship and you may be blocked long enough for the rewards to become out-levelled. I'd say "rewarding" is just under average.
Satisfaction is another twist of rewarding, to win a challenge boosts one's ego greatly. See next paragraph though.
Challenging? Part of the content is challenging, indeed. However, since much content is out-levelled way too quick the challenges are few and far apart: as I must skip many quests ... Fail on this item. Why not make more game content scalable so it adapts to player-level and the strength of fellowships?
Surprising? I am surprised by how tight Lotro and Tolkien's works are and the amazing looks of many worlds (if I avoid looking too closely); but no, Lotro is not surprising but is an old-styled game system with a clunky (somewhat error-prone) technology that requires lots of superfluous click-throughs and with massive time-sinks on filling deeds by doing out-levelled content (virtue deeds essentially).
CRAFTING
Long since being a crafter-by-heart (renowned in some games) I was curious on Lotro's crafting system, ignoring the bad rumours I had heard. At first sight crafting looked good; hundreds of recipes, seven professions (plus three for gathering), and bind-on-equip which would imply a decent business for merchants.
However, I quickly became disappointed; superficially good-looking but hollow and flawed. Googling around I found that Lotro does not score high, rarely at any top-10 lists. Sorry but Lotro's crafting system just makes me sad.
Locations: I usually like chilling out at some workshop, idling, chatting, or crafting some stuff, but here I cannot even choose location freely since the superior equipment is available at just a few places depending on profession.
Even worse is how dull and flawed the resource system is implemented. As a newcomer I found that from tier 3 (Expert) the resources were unavailable in the areas where * I played (the resource-areas mismatch the character and quest levels), and it grew even worse at tier 4. When I eventually could crit the stuff I once wanted, I had levelled up and were then back at square one again, wanting stuff which I could not crit and the next-level resources were unavailable in the areas where... (repeat from *).
A friend of mine put it this way: "If the crafting is not made interesting, then it should be out of one's way."
I cannot but agree, but Lotro's crafting is just up my face, big time. It is not implemented to be interesting in itself, only by providing an impressive number of recipes. More effort has been spent on limiting speed-grinders than on creating something truly interesting and rewarding.
Some say that I should ask my Kinship, or buy. I disagree, being unable to equip myself with critted bits I need then and there, bits which I can see dimmed out in the crafting panel, that just makes me frustrated. This system subtracts massively from the "entertaining-and-rewarding" criteria.
On a positive note, I like the different ingredients. However, there are two flaws: the number of different kinds does not match the insufficient storage (noted above); and, valuable loot-items does not work well together with randomness; loosing many hard-to-get shards in a row while reading crit chance well above 60 or 70% is just frustrating. The problem is that expected randomness becomes skewed when many players tap from the same random-generator. (Remember that a computer never yields true randomness and there are many factors that influence the outcome for an individual player badly. Most M.Sc. Comp.Sc. programmes have at least one maths class that deals with those phenomena. This particular problem is well known and software algorithms exist that ensure better randomness for the individual, but not using any of those is disrespectful.)
Crafting time: While it is understandable that nothing takes zero time it cannot be justified that chopping a decent pile of wood or smelting a barrel of ore must be such a time-sink. Certainly not when having mastered that tier and beyond. Shorter times for masters would be "rewarding" but now implementation efforts are put into boring time-sinks. Next, Farmers must have been thought out and implemented by a summer intern; honestly, who thinks farming is fun after the initial few batches? Boring, non-exciting, and without surprises --- a true time-sink.
Summary: The abundance of recipes and the variety of ingredients do not make it up for all of the shortcomings in the crafting and resource systems. I could write a lengthy list of what could be done, but do you really think that would matter?
Auction Houses are few and far apart, and not in the direct vicinity of any craft centre. The UI for buyers is decent, no more and no less; it provides some features for searching and filtering.
However, the UI for sellers is cumbersome, to say it kindly; drag-and-drop and select duration and fill in prices, one item at a time; for a true crafter this takes way too much time. Overdue items are returned via mail, one mail per item, and hence without any notion of re-listing or remembered/pre-filled values when putting them up for sale again. Considering how awkward both the put-up-for-sale and the retrieval are, why is sale-duration just two days? Altogether it is no wonder the auction houses are badly stocked!!! How many crafters are willing to spend much game-time on dysfunctional windows? Thus, shopping for a particular item usually requires many visits, still without finding that special attribute you want. Being in a great kinship helps, but should that be required if the crafting-auctioning really worked well?
Summarizing the resource, crafting and merchandise systems is a depressing story. I know some players question this and say Lotro is great; sorry guys, you've probably never crafted in any game with good crafting and auction systems. The only upside is the abundance of recipes, but the uninteresting crafting, the flawed resource system, and the dysfunctional auction houses breaks the deal completely.
HOUSING
Having SWG's renowned housing in mind I was curious on Lotro's housing system. Happily I visited all homestead areas and inspected all house types inside out, as well as their neighbourhoods. Nice! And finally I settled with a small hobbit hole in The Shire.
Cool, a travel-to-home skill---kind of an extra milestone---and lower prices at the local shop, great. And a local vault, too. The common areas are nicely set up for RP or for a fellowship to hang out a while. All in all they look good and the instancing theoretically allows for an unlimited amount of players having a home.
However, soon I became really disappointed. An extremely poor number of furnishing hooks and for decorating options there is only rotation. Remember now, in SWG a house could take 100 to 1,500 items which could be put down anywhere and rotated/moved in whatever fashion you wanted. Literally. Thus players were combining the most unexpected items to look like whatever. Many players spent hundreds of hours decorating the most spectacular homes, shops, workshops, faction headquarters, restaurants, etc. Furnishing in Lotro is a joke...no laughters tho.
And Turbine's tight fisted thinking about poor storage shines through again. Not even a way to upgrade anything but a few tiny boxes Turbine calls chests.
I seldom see anybody, the homesteads are dead zones. Had the service centre been shared between all or several layers and only the streets and houses were instanced, then the homesteads would be livelier.
No, the housing system is no more than another "milestone", cheaper goods, and some poor storage. It is neither fun, rewarding, nor surprising.
SUMMARY
Overall Lotro is a good game, but I also see many awful things. Should I have avoided and ignored those and focused on the good things only? Absolutely not, that would be dishonest and unfair, both to the you and to the developers (if they care?). Frankly, the devs could make Lotro a great game by replacing aged or badly designed systems, some projects are harder but none is impossible. My thoughts instantly goes to RoI; most players who leave Lotro should have stayed much longer if Lotro had a modern and fresh design and somewhat improved graphics. Replacing bigger chunks of old technology and bad design-patterns will definitely appeal to those who once left for those reasons, but new content will not!
I congratulate Turbine to their success with the F2P strategy and the Lotro Store with its add-ons. However, Turbine must evaluate their unkind VIP treatment. Players who prefer subscription over F2P should be rewarded, but today that is hardly true as the monthly fee unlocks just some simple, basic features; those are not even remotely close to price-worthy. I guess the easiest way is 50-90% price deduction on many non-combat related items, increased amount of monthly TP and re-sub bonuses, and major housing improvements.
Levelling and quests: Today a new game stands out for its fresh ideas: The Secret World. No levels but progressively harder-to-obtain skills and abilities, a very limited number of active abilities but bazillions (literally) of possible combinations warrants unique characters, tiered quests which do not require silly-travelling, complete freedom in character progression and to explore the worlds.
Crafting: SWG is listed post-mortem as best-game ever. What did it have that Lotro does not? Crafting was made interesting by devoted developers! Its dynamic resource system; that was a mini-game within the game and all devoted/addicted crafters spent much time surveying the worlds for better resources, but also a rookie/newcomer could craft some good stuff by cleverly combining the resources he had. While SWG was not perfect it is still unrivalled---how long will that last?
Housing and furnishing: SWG is still listed as best-game ever. It allowed players to drop up to 1500 items wherever in their houses and to move/rotate them however they wished for. Dedicated decorators spent an awful lot of time on the most fascinating creations.
However, Lotro has a superb support for musicians. And also a story-line which involves Gandalf, Frodo, and dear Sam! Administrate those assets the best way possible and improve their stay in Lotro, please.
Some of the complaints are valid. In Turbine's defense though, I have to say that every MMO has it's issues. I know, because I try most of the new ones and a lot of what you said is the same in every MMO out there.
I'm not debating with your observations, I'm just saying most of what you said is current in the genres of MMOs as a whole, not just LOTRO.
The other day a Turbine representative announced a 6th bag. Remember though, all his talk about technology and databases is just bull. Of course these things take DB-space, but negligible compared to other things in an MMO. The only dilemma Turbine has is the amount of F2P versus VIPs; the latter group pay regularly and the former not at all or sparsely, but VIP get a bad return on investment. Doubling the bag and vault sizes for active VIPs is one solution, but there are other ways ... just don't treat adult players with more bull, please.
Dude, you don't know. You have only been here for ten months. Turbine has been wrestling with this problem for five years. You weren't here when they started trying to make out of the box solutions like making bigger stacks of items, quest wallets, scroll cases and condensing medallion counts and making them account wide so you would not have to store them.
Even someone as technically ignorant as me knows that these workarounds cost time and money. They are not going to wrestle with this problem for five years just to give the players a bunch of bull and charge them for an extra bag 5 years later.
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, totally worn out & proclaiming "WOW, what a ride!"
Civ II rules after all these years......
...Dude, you don't know. You have only been here for ten months. Turbine has been wrestling with this problem for five years. You weren't here when they started trying to make out of the box solutions like making bigger stacks of items, quest wallets, scroll cases and condensing medallion counts and making them account wide so you would not have to store them.
Even someone as technically ignorant as me knows that these workarounds cost time and money. They are not going to wrestle with this problem for five years just to give the players a bunch of bull and charge them for an extra bag 5 years later.
Ahem, as if being here 10 months or 5 years matters much about knowledge or ignorance? Such remarks are moot.
The problem Turbine has is exactly what I wrote, F2P don't pay the bills unless they have to. If F2P had bigger storage for free there would be less money, and every VIP would create several F2P accounts for storage if they needed to and using a house as transfer point. Hence Turbine must limit storage and ask credits for it, but now VIP happens to pay their bills without much in return. This is certainly not about technology, it's about a business model. I don't know what you do for a living but I know what I do, and my experience with the business takes me a long way 8-)
You may know me from other forums. I notice you did not comment on the Legendary Item system. I find it an interesting, although sometimes frustrating, feature that you only encounter with characters above level 50. Nor do you comment on the PvMP features of the Ettenmoors, either from the Creep or Freep side. My wife, for one, is a very enthusiastic Creep player, and I have a special fondness of teaching politeness to hobbits.
I'd like to point out that there are some vast differences in the game and game play after you reach the level cap. Now, Turbine has added features at lower levels to allow players to more easily and quickly reach the level cap and the more challenging content they offer at that level. Unfortunately, as you observe, that is at the expense of on-level content completion at lower levels. I don't think we can expect to see anywhere near the same effort spent on low-level content as we see with new content in new regions as the game follows the main characters further along their path to Mordor. I expect we will see more changes to make it easier and faster for new players and new characters to catch up to the characters at level-cap.
Because levels 50, 60, 65 are no longer the level cap, the wide assortment of equipment, and content that used to be popular at those levels has lost it's appeal. At the current level cap, there is much content and equipment that improves ones capabilities at level 75. That is all going to be obsolete when RoR arrives and the level cap rises to 85. By the time our characters reach level 77 or so, players will likely be out-leveling (at least some of) the gear they spent months acquiring at level 75. Whether that is considered a bad thing, or just part of the game, is a matter for individual option.
Thanks for posting this review. It caused me to pause and review the things I like and dis-like about the game.
I have to say that this is a pretty fair review I know if I did one, of my 5 years playing it would be a whole lot more negative.
Agreed. I am in no way denying that. In fact, I agree with a lot of it. Especially with character appearance. What he said was spot on.
And he is totally right about how good SWG's housing system was and how much ours is lacking.
He failed to mention the outside ambient noises in Moria and the present condition of the forum page. Those are issues that irk me.
I'm just saying that the inventory bag issue is not a lot of bull given to the players. They have been working on bag space ever since I started playing. There are still storage issues but it's not from lack of effort.
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, totally worn out & proclaiming "WOW, what a ride!"
Civ II rules after all these years......
Props for taking the time to write that down. I found myself disagreeing with about 70% of it, but everyone has their opinions. I personally hated the movie Drive but most everyone gave it 5/5 stars, so I understand we won't always agree.
Sure, LOTR has it's share of problems, but it's by far the best MMO I've played in 12 years of MMO playing. I don't expect epic graphics and perfectly rendered 3D images. Sure, the engine could use an update and I'm sure some day it will get one but I don't need eye candy to entertain me when the game itself is so well constructed.
All in all, you could make this list about every MMO.
We started playing at around the same time but I disagree with a fair number of your points. I am also a former SWG player and I do miss the housing system, however I also remember how bad most people's houses looked. A few people had amazing artistic creations, but the vast majority of houses were nothing more than junk catchers. Places used to dump things out of a full pack on the run.
I wonder if some of your complaints about the game don't actually come from not having a good group of friends to play with/help you learn the game? Are you primarily playing alone?
"Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart." - Marcus Aelius Aurelius
You may know me from other forums. I notice you did not comment on the Legendary Item system. I find it an interesting, although sometimes frustrating, feature that you only encounter with characters above level 50. Nor do you comment on the PvMP features of the Ettenmoors, either from the Creep or Freep side. My wife, for one, is a very enthusiastic Creep player, and I have a special fondness of teaching politeness to hobbits.
I'd like to point out that there are some vast differences in the game and game play after you reach the level cap. Now, Turbine has added features at lower levels to allow players to more easily and quickly reach the level cap and the more challenging content they offer at that level. Unfortunately, as you observe, that is at the expense of on-level content completion at lower levels. ...
Spot on!
When I begun playing Lotro about 10 months back I indeed had an open mind and the first weeks I had a good time. I did not come alone though, several of my best friends from the now dead SWG came with me, none of them are now playing Lotro but have left for good or are "trying other games for a while". Several of them subbed == real dollars for Turbine.
Why is that? Why do they go elsewhere? If the grass is that green and the moon is made of Stilton cheese at level cap, why did they leave? Your comment was spot on!!! Turbine are losing players long before they reach those greener pastures and creamier cakes and sweeter lollipops up there. Sorry, but if the journey ain't a good trip then the destination may be desolate.
In shareholders view the loss of players is lost money. I hope they don't understand.
I have so many excellent memories of playing this game. Things just aren't the same anymore. I can't put my finger on it, but I struggle to enjoy the game anymore. With such an enormous grind to "max" a character, I am overwhelmed before I even start. Heck my burg is 63 and I can't even finish it off. With so many virtues to grind, class & legendary traits to work on, gear to obtain (don't even mention PvP gear now), jewelry to craft/obtain, reputation with factions, LI's to build including, relics (settings, runes, gems), starlit crystals, damage type scrolls, and IXP, on & on & on. The grind is too much and too long. Oh and housing needs fixed so badly. There's nothing more discouraging than going to my old house in a neighborhood where everyone else has vanished. I literally live in a graveyard of broken memories and dilapidated old shuttered homes. There is no joy in my neighborhood.
I started playing LOTRO for about a year ago. At the time, I had been playing EQ2 for almost 2 years, but I jumped that ship after SOE got hacked and players' personal and credit card info was compromised. Over the years, I've tried many, many other games. I think it's important to evaluate MMOs as a whole; every game always has one or two things better than some other game. But, as a whole, LOTRO is the best game package that I have played so far.
Is the LOTRO housing system as good as EQ2 or SWG? Absolutely not. On the other hand, the rampant increases in house and guild hall options in EQ2 broke the game. Try putting your raid together when you're only getting 5 fps in your guild hall. This also goes for storage space. Of course we would like more, but not at the cost of game performance.
Is the slow-horse to Esteldin a pain sometimes? Certainly; however, too much swift travel (and *gasp* dreaded flying mounts) will make a reasonably big game world get really small in a big hurry. Besides, a slow horse gives me a chance to grab a cup of coffee or put the dogs out.
And LOTRO crafting? Personally, I like the system. It doesn't take an excessive amount of materials or time to level it up, and the crafted items are generally useful. I also like the vocation system; all you need is 4 alts to cover all the professions. Most games need a lot more than that. Anyone tried crafting in DDO? Scary.
Lastly, I want to comment on Turbine customer support. No complaints here! I've played other games where it was impossible to reach a living person by phone or email, where your only recourse were out of date FAQs. And I will never forgive SOE for the way they treated players after the hack. No communication, explanation, or apology for weeks.
*gets down off soapbox*
Is LOTRO perfect? Of course not; but what is? The perfect game may not be possible. Nonetheless, what LOTRO offers (pretty style, entertaining adventuring, great lore, the best community) is bound to keep me around for a good long time.
Running LOTRO on a Mac Pro 2x2.66 GHz Dual-Core using Bootcamp
Ahem, as if being here 10 months or 5 years matters much about knowledge or ignorance? Such remarks are moot.
The problem Turbine has is exactly what I wrote, F2P don't pay the bills unless they have to. If F2P had bigger storage for free there would be less money, and every VIP would create several F2P accounts for storage if they needed to and using a house as transfer point. Hence Turbine must limit storage and ask credits for it, but now VIP happens to pay their bills without much in return. This is certainly not about technology, it's about a business model. I don't know what you do for a living but I know what I do, and my experience with the business takes me a long way 8-)
Sorry, you're wrong about that - Nymphonic is quite correct.
It is a technology issue. Every change Turbine makes which affects the amount of memory required for a character makes a huge difference. That information has to be transferred every time you change zones, and every time you see another player, and every time the information is saved to the server (which IIRC is every 8 seconds or so), etc. Turbine has described this before, and those of us who have been here 5 years remember it.
Adding a new pack with 15 more slots is a BIG deal. That's a lot more memory required. Imagine if every one of those slots contained an LI. Each LI has a lot of information associated with it (level, legacies, tiers, ranks, damage, repair state, etc).
Transferring this information is one of the main causes of lag. When you're in a location with a lot of other players (like Galtrev, or the 'moors), that information as to be transferred from every player to every other player.
In fact, I'm quite surprised they are going to add a new bag, since they system is currently experience quite a few lag issues. It's only going to get worse
Though I can’t truly give an valid opinion on housing, being this the first mmo I played which actually has homesteads, I have considered that it is lacking in variety; in spite of there being houses in accord to the 3 different races, there is only one style of house for standard deluxe and kinship, hence if you want a house with a second floor, you’ll have to settle for an elven home even if you prefer a man style home; Aside from this it’s a throw of the dice for you to find the house at the place you want, and in many occasions, the location you would like to settle on i.e. near a waterfall or by the river or pond, does not have the house you want i.e a standard instead of a deluxe.
I still don’t have much of a problem with the graphic quality of the game; I might in a couple or so years when Turbines competitors have produced quality graphics that will leave WOW looking like minecraft and LOTRO only a little better. But I have hopes that Turbine will find a way to update its graphics before then.
I noticed you did not mention Turbines new addition, the soldier on landscape, which has been a heated topic ever since it came out, mostly due to its cost of 100tp per hour use, but also on its failure to meet expectations, and which helps to prove the point of how Turbine fails in its treatment to VIPs as they too are required to pay the 100 TP per hour of soldier on landscape use.
One of my biggest chagrins is in relation to 1st age weapons since they are extremely hard to come by, as they can only be crafted and to craft them you require a sigil and the skill to produce the item you want, i.e. if you want a sword you have to be a weapon smith.
The sigils and symbols (used for 2nd age items) can only be obtained in a Raid and which only at random occasions, or it can be obtained at ridiculous prices at the auction house; You can also purchase 1st age weapons at the auction house as well, but these are usually at even higher prices than the sigils themselves, some selling for up to 100 G.
LOTRO is truly a fellowship game, and though turbine has tried to make it so that players can have an easier time finding adventure buddies, it still has a long way to go to make fellowing at whim a reality.
If I could offer a bit of advice to turbine it would be to take a page from the GW2 method of adventuring, where players within an area are immediately integrated into the events within.
In spite of my many complains, I love LOTRO, I love the feeling of being part of middle earth, and exploring the lands that have influenced my imagination so deeply; I’m an avid player and plan to be so for as long as I am able to, you can’t expect perfection but there is always room for improvement.
Ahem, as if being here 10 months or 5 years matters much about knowledge or ignorance? Such remarks are moot.
The problem Turbine has is exactly what I wrote, F2P don't pay the bills unless they have to. If F2P had bigger storage for free there would be less money, and every VIP would create several F2P accounts for storage if they needed to and using a house as transfer point. Hence Turbine must limit storage and ask credits for it, but now VIP happens to pay their bills without much in return. This is certainly not about technology, it's about a business model. I don't know what you do for a living but I know what I do, and my experience with the business takes me a long way 8-)
My understanding is that the issue of the number of bags was not related to storing the information but rather that the information related to your bags could be accessed anywhere and that meant the data was always being updated and sent to your computer. Its a data transmission issue not a data storage issue. As data transfers have gotten faster Turbine has increased the size of stacks in our bags, moved quest items out of our bags, and added the currency wallet. The majority of these changes are things that you have not seen in your oh so long 10 months of play. But I am sure that your correct, you like all the other internet game experts who have never seen a line of the games code know much more about what can and cant be done then the developers who work with the code on a daily basis. You feel its all about the money so it has to be all about the money. It cant be that the technology used to run the game has improved in the last 5 years since the game went live and Turbine is doing thier best use those improvements in technology to increase the number of our bags.
Last edited by ThistleRose3; May 29 2012 at 09:56 PM.
tl;dr: LotRO isn't perfect or have all of the features that the newbie wants from other games.
News flash: every studio develops MMOs differently. They start with a design philosophy and a software architecture that makes sense for that philosophy. You can TRY to make a game that has the best features from all other games, but you'll end up with a giant unusable pile of junk, and most people end up having differing opinions on what the "best" is anyway. Take it for what it is. Have a good time playing the game, and stop worrying about trying to impress people with your encyclopedic knowledge of the game's perceived shortcomings.
I started playing LOTRO for about a year ago. At the time, I had been playing EQ2 for almost 2 years, but I jumped that ship after SOE got hacked and players' personal and credit card info was compromised. Over the years, I've tried many, many other games. I think it's important to evaluate MMOs as a whole; every game always has one or two things better than some other game. But, as a whole, LOTRO is the best game package that I have played so far.
Is the LOTRO housing system as good as EQ2 or SWG? Absolutely not. On the other hand, the rampant increases in house and guild hall options in EQ2 broke the game. Try putting your raid together when you're only getting 5 fps in your guild hall. This also goes for storage space. Of course we would like more, but not at the cost of game performance.
Is the slow-horse to Esteldin a pain sometimes? Certainly; however, too much swift travel (and *gasp* dreaded flying mounts) will make a reasonably big game world get really small in a big hurry. Besides, a slow horse gives me a chance to grab a cup of coffee or put the dogs out.
And LOTRO crafting? Personally, I like the system. It doesn't take an excessive amount of materials or time to level it up, and the crafted items are generally useful. I also like the vocation system; all you need is 4 alts to cover all the professions. Most games need a lot more than that. Anyone tried crafting in DDO? Scary.
Lastly, I want to comment on Turbine customer support. No complaints here! I've played other games where it was impossible to reach a living person by phone or email, where your only recourse were out of date FAQs. And I will never forgive SOE for the way they treated players after the hack. No communication, explanation, or apology for weeks.
*gets down off soapbox*
Is LOTRO perfect? Of course not; but what is? The perfect game may not be possible. Nonetheless, what LOTRO offers (pretty style, entertaining adventuring, great lore, the best community) is bound to keep me around for a good long time.
This is pretty much how I feel. I've played a lot of MMOs and loved certain features of many of them and been frustrated by some things in LOTRO at times, but when all is said and done, LOTRO suits me best overall. I love being in middle earth, adventuring with friends, growing with the game. I'm all for any improvements that come down the pike, but I'd rather enjoy what it is, than think about what it isn't.
I knew I recognised the name Zimoon from my old SWG days, and I agree on the SWG crafting and housing. Nothing will beat those. However, although I loved SWG crafting, with it's uniqueness of resources, I still also love LOTRO crafting for its simplicity. It is still fairly quick, compared to waiting a few days while your harvesters gathered enough steel or whatever. Here we loot as we quest and so have the needed mats on hand most of the time. It's quick, it's fun, but it is nothing like SWG.
The same applies to housing. Only 1 house per server per account. Not good, and house storage is terrible. My shop on SWG had maximum capaicity of 1500 items, and more often than not, was pretty much maxed out. Hence lots of other characters having several houses for all the other junk I collected.
But, having played since release, I still love this game and I'm going nowhere,
in spite of there being houses in accord to the 3 different races
Not trying to nitpick, but if you haven't checked out all 4 housing areas, it's worth visiting each to appreciate the architecture. (The 3 may have just been a typo, but I don't want anyone to miss out. Housing areas are SW of Thorin's Gate, SE of Bree town, SE of Michel Delving, and somewhere near Duilond or Celondim.)
Not trying to nitpick, but if you haven't checked out all 4 housing areas, it's worth visiting each to appreciate the architecture. (The 3 may have just been a typo, but I don't want anyone to miss out. Housing areas are SW of Thorin's Gate, SE of Bree town, SE of Michel Delving, and somewhere near Duilond or Celondim.)
AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGG GHHHHHHHHHHHH! how could I write such an obvious and blatant mistake.
I do sincerely apologize and yes I am aware of all 4 homesteads, I looked at them thoroughly before choosing on a home. All locations are beautiful and well oriented towards each race, but I stand behind my previous comments regarding the lack of variety for each race, and the difficulty of finding a house in the location that one would prefer or that the house itself is not what one would rather such as a location hear a pond or a waterfall but he house itself is a standard and not a more ample deluxe or vice-verse.
tl;dr: LotRO isn't perfect or have all of the features that the newbie wants from other games.
News flash: every studio develops MMOs differently. They start with a design philosophy and a software architecture that makes sense for that philosophy. You can TRY to make a game that has the best features from all other games, but you'll end up with a giant unusable pile of junk, and most people end up having differing opinions on what the "best" is anyway. Take it for what it is. Have a good time playing the game, and stop worrying about trying to impress people with your encyclopedic knowledge of the game's perceived shortcomings.
Well if you didn't read it...ah nevermind...
+1 Rep for the OP for taking the time to put out a well thought-out, articulate, and constructive piece of feedback.
However, in the end of the day Lotro is aged. You should not look too closely at anything if you want to retain your illusion about them. Actually, not much, if anything, stand a closer look as the bitmaps were aged and dull already when Lotro was new. And sadly, a distant look is impossible as the graphics engine cuts off details not too far away (GeForce GTX 570 4MB and options at "ultra high").
As a Founder/Lifetime player I have a decidedly different perspective on things.
First off, I wanted to comment on the Graphics issue. This is a frequent criticism of LOTRO. However, the question is -- do you want LOTRO to mimic real-life, or to give you an un-real Superman's perspective on things?
Step outside your door and look up and down the street -- How far can you see? How much detail can you see?
I realize the "pop" issue as an "interesting complaint." However, the solution to that is NOT Turbine's but rather the individuals PC and Graphics set-up. The "Landscape Block" design and its limitations has been discussed often on these forums, usually in the tech sections. And note that the "pop" issue is a different issue from the "hitch" issue, and "lag" yet another, even though they are all related.
But again, go outside and tell me how far you can see and how much detail. Can you recognize a friend a block away? Two Blocks away? How about someone you only met once before? How close do they have to be before you can see enough features to recognize who they are?
Much of the landscape in LOTRO is of surprisingly wide vistas. Vistas which reach out "as far as the eye can see." But even eagle-eyed Elves can only see so much detail. We all wish we had the telescopic zoom vision our favorite superhero has, but we don't. And neither does our "camera's eye" in LOTRO. And note how radically your vision distance changes if you switch your camera from "overhead, eagle-eye" to "over-the-sholder" first-person. Are you a Hobbit or Dwarf? An Elf or Man? The level of your eyes above ground level radically alter how much you can see.
And remember, "graphics perception" is all in the eye of the beholder.
I happen to play LOTRO via a completely (according to Turbine) unsupported platform -- a 27 inch iMac running Codeweaver's CrossOver (WINE). This gives me advantages and disadvantages. The graphics detail and resolution on the 27 inch iMac is far superior to the detail and resolution available on my PC connected to my 42 inch HD TV. Largely and simply, because on the iMac I play at maximum resolution 2650x1440 while on the HD TV I can only get 1280x1024 -- the difference IS quite noticeable.
The differences in "bitmaps" Zimoon mentions is primarily a difference in the technology, techniques (and probably expertise) of the graphics developers back in 2005. They were also constrained, at that time, by the fact that PC graphics, which the game was designed for, were, by today's standards, incredibly primitive. AND by the fact that the Internet itself had extremely limited bandwidth for something like 90% of its users. A 6meg DSL or 10meg Cable connection were extremely expensive and quite rare -- today they are the norm. Distributing a game on a couple of CDs also limited graphics content. That's why Mines of Moria switched from CD distribution to DvD distribution.
However, even with those constraints, the graphics in LOTRO generated a constant stream of complaints about how they "overtaxed" peoples PCs at the time. And still, the solution today to a huge portion of the complaints about Graphics performance is to "Lower your settings." Those settings have nothing to do with the game-engine and everything to do with your PC and Graphics setup-up. Yes, LOTRO, as do a number of other games today, push graphics technology to its limits. Limits which, I would venture, 99% of the game-playing population have no concepts of. They just expect things to work because they expect them to work. But that is a whole other topic, beaten to death in the tech forums.
All of that said, Zimoon is only looking at the "original Shadows of Angmar content" of LOTRO. He has not experienced the expansions - Mines of Moria, Mirkwood, Isengard or The Great River.
The content and game-engine has changed and much of the old content has been continuously updated.
Having multiple toons, I just recently completed the last 4 books of Volume I for the first time since the SoA release. And yes, the game-play is very 2005-ish. (Remember LOTRO was in development for at least 2 years prior to its release in 2007.) Those quests are quite different in look and feel compared to the Rise of Isengard quests of Volume III. Everything about them is different from NPC interactions to the whole Quest mechanism. These changes continue into The Great River expansion.
With the most recent release of Update 7, Turbine recognized the Moria was both a story-line funnel as well as a Player Bottleneck. You had to get through Moria "to get to the other side." And getting through Moria was not easy.
One other "feature" about LOTRO which stands out, making it different from other MMOs -- Guilds, or as they are now known as "Kinships." In other MMOs, Guilds server the primary purpose of providing cannon fodder for Raids. They really have no "Fellowship" component, where Fellowship truly means "Fellowship." I have been a member of The Old Timer's Guild since the pre-beta of DDO, long ago. We do have a Guild which functions as a fellowship, in-game and out. In-game, this translates into the ability to find "questing buddies" and "crafting support." Our Guild-Crafters, routinely complete "orders" for specific items for other kin-mates allowing those Kin-mates to upgrade their weapons and armour with minimal effort, as well as provide resources for other kin-mates who are leveling their own crafters.
This is the kind of player inter-action which LOTRO was DESIGNED around. The concept of "The Fellowship." LOTRO is not a solo game, although it can be soloed. But doing things that way looses a lot of the impact of the game -- especially when supplemented with a useable voice system like Mumble or Ventrillo. (The in-game "Game spy" system "works" but that is all you can say about it. And why should Turbine bother with in-game voice when there are far superior technologies available.)
Bill Magill - Mac Player - Old Timers Guild- Gladden - The restrictions on signatures keep getting more and more absurd
Perhaps this isn't entirely appropriate on a LOTRO newsgroup, but . . .
Given the overwhelmingly underwhelming review that started this thread, I'd like to hear some better MMO alternatives -- F2P.
I've only played MMOs for a couple of years -- sparingly. I started on DDO and was impressed something that good could be free. I eventually stalled because I'm a solo player (I just don't feel like I can commit the time to a fellowship when I might have to get up at any moment and take care of the kids or something -- I've literrally never once been in a fellowship). It just took too long to level. I couldn't find much free content after a little while, and playing the same quests over-and-over got tiring.
So I searched for a new one, and found LOTRO. I've enjoyed it so much more. Similar but maybe better graphics. Leveling is much faster. There is a LOT of free content. I'm getting to the point where I might be stalled at level 44 (I have 3 other characters at lower levels just to generate TP). Hard to take the time to get enough free TPs to purchase new content, though it is possible.
I read somewhere recently that Aion was slightly better than LOTRO. It took me about 3 minutes to disagree.
And that's the extent of my experience. I think I like LOTRO enough to eventually spend some money when a good TP deal comes along (I'll never be VIP). However, I at least want to start with free content, and it is in that vein that I'd be interested in hearing the alternatives that are similar/better than LOTRO.
As a Founder/Lifetime player I have a decidedly different perspective on things.
One other "feature" about LOTRO which stands out, making it different from other MMOs -- Guilds, or as they are now known as "Kinships." In other MMOs, Guilds server the primary purpose of providing cannon fodder for Raids. They really have no "Fellowship" component, where Fellowship truly means "Fellowship."
Wow - the "One other ..." sentence is probably the most untrue thing I have ever read on the Lotro forums, although I have seen a lot of misinformation about "other" MMOs. This is pretty ridiculous. Nothing about a Kin in Lotro is unique. People play in guilds in WoW and other games exactly the same as in Lotro. There are all types of kins - some more close "fellowship" type and some more casual and impersonal. All guilds and Kins are different - you can't really generalize about them in different games. I will grant that people in Lotro are generally nice, but there are terrible, and good, kins in every MMO.
I would ask how you are basing this (what MMOs have you played since you have been at Lotro for 5 years?), but obviously there is no way for one person to really know what many kins are like in any game - except through general word of mouth. How could you prove some type of kins don't exist. But I have been in great kins in other MMOs and know they exist.
I sympathize with the desire to do and see everything at level, but it's not possible any longer to do it all on one character. I also think that before you submit your final review you owe it to yourself and to the game to play at least one character all the way through to the level cap.
Looking at your player profile, it looks as though your highest level character is only level 43 with 6 alts in their 20s and 30s. So in effect, what you've been doing is playing and replaying all the oldest material in the game. As someone else pointed out, the first 50 levels were mostly written between about 2004 and 2007. Some of the areas have seen some updates, but many remain substantially the same. Of course they're out of date!
There are still flaws and problems as you get further along, but the latest expansions have seen a conscious attempt by the Devs to find more interesting and entertaining ways to write and deliver quest material. You can get a preview of this more modern style by playing through Evendim where they experimented with some of the types of quests they've used more extensively in the newer areas.
The game architecture is also showing its age. A lot of it is built on a derivative of the engine the first Turbine developers wrote in the middle 1990s. At this stage, WB probably would never allow them the budget for a complete rewrite on an up-to-date engine so we're likely stuck with incremental changes and the overall hope that nothing finally and irrevocably breaks the old code.
Is LOTRO perfect? I doubt you'd get even the most starry-eyed fan trying to argue that. But it's pretty good in many aspects and once you find a congenial group of people to play with and talk to, it's good enough for many of us.
Perhaps this isn't entirely appropriate on a LOTRO newsgroup, but . . .
Given the overwhelmingly underwhelming review that started this thread, I'd like to hear some better MMO alternatives -- F2P.
I've only played MMOs for a couple of years -- sparingly. I started on DDO and was impressed something that good could be free. I eventually stalled because I'm a solo player (I just don't feel like I can commit the time to a fellowship when I might have to get up at any moment and take care of the kids or something -- I've literrally never once been in a fellowship). It just took too long to level. I couldn't find much free content after a little while, and playing the same quests over-and-over got tiring.
So I searched for a new one, and found LOTRO. I've enjoyed it so much more. Similar but maybe better graphics. Leveling is much faster. There is a LOT of free content. I'm getting to the point where I might be stalled at level 44 (I have 3 other characters at lower levels just to generate TP). Hard to take the time to get enough free TPs to purchase new content, though it is possible.
I read somewhere recently that Aion was slightly better than LOTRO. It took me about 3 minutes to disagree.
And that's the extent of my experience. I think I like LOTRO enough to eventually spend some money when a good TP deal comes along (I'll never be VIP). However, I at least want to start with free content, and it is in that vein that I'd be interested in hearing the alternatives that are similar/better than LOTRO.
You say your enjoying playing the game so what difference does it make if someone else makes a long post stating he does not enjoy it? Did you let an unknown person on the internet convince you to stop eatting at a resturant you enjoy just because they dont like it? The thing about games is that there are a lot of different types and some suit one type of player much more then another. I enjoy playing LOTRO but do not like first person shooters but that does not mean that I feel that people who enjoy fps should stop playing them because I dont like them.
You also stated that you have reached lvl 44 without paying anything. Thats a lot of free play time and maybe now you should consider spending a little money to reward the people who have entertained you for so long. If you do a search you should be able to find a copy of the US version of MoM, Mines of Moria, for less then $20. This will make you vip for 30 days, give you the two prem classes, two more charater slots and access to the Moria quests. With the TP you will earn from being VIP and completing deeds in Moria you should have enough to purchase the Edenwaith quest pack. If you do these you should have no problems making it to lvl 65 where you will need to decide if you want to puchase the Rise of Isenguard expansion or just quests. Twenty dollars should provide you with enough content to keep you entertained for most of the summer if you dont roar through the content.
Thanks for all feedback, the positive as well as the rest. I have held on to a response to see what you guys have to say.
A common way to negate somebody's message is to attack the individual rather than the message, so also in this topic; politicians use that technique to dodge a debate they risk losing, by attacking the other person. Just remember a few things: I do not attack you. I do not attack Lotro but I tell my newcomer's experience along with constructive criticism. I do not know your profession and neither do you know mine, any of us may be the expert game-developer. Some of you turned into defence mode; don't do that too quickly, otherwise you will definitely miss out on a lot of good stuff people are saying -- but you are occupied steaming.
Remember that I wrote my fair experience, as I perceive it. There are many many things I did not mention, both good and bad, but those would not make my newcomer's tale better, just longer.
About databases and games: I assume that few of you work within that field, right? Please, accept the fact that there are many many ways to implement databases + servers + Internet + clients. The server may be a game-engine like Lotro, but also banks, Google, Facebook, etc. The client may be games, or your web browser, etc. However, they all share some common denominators, always. Some companies may have chosen great implementations with very few bottlenecks and good performance, while others are less fortunate. What you tell me is that Lotro is in the unfortunate team, but the facts are beyond me, and beyond you too (unless you work at Turbine and have access to the source code). If you are not in the industry, do not rashly echo things that you have heard others saying, you may with the best intentions end up echoing rubbish. There are some posts in this topic which are not in contact with reality, do you have the technical knowhow to find them?
Graphics: Yes, "'graphics perception' is all in the eye of the beholder". However, when I walk through a landscape IRL I see a woody mountain ahead, soon I begin to see trees, and finally also leaves, flowers, insects, etc. In Lotro I see an almost naked mountain ahead, and closer it suddenly spawns trees; or I ride over open fields and suddenly something large spawns, just 200 meters away or so. Games much older than Lotro handled those weird effects much nicer using some cheap, simplistic tricks, and spawning in low-resolution trees (or whatever) early on. The load for this is 100% on your computer, that is why I chose "ultra high" settings for my powerful gaming machine. On my older machine I would suffice with "medium".
If graphics "is frequent criticism of LOTRO" I would sit back and ask myself if all those players are correct or not. I would not defend it, neither historically, technically, nor otherwise. Then I would ask myself, "what can be done now?" Lotro has lots that can be done. If Turbine wants to.
Interestingly, none commented on the horrendous virtue-deeds system. Probably that means that none of us enjoy killing hundreds after hundreds of certain creatures for 1 point of something. Hopefully Turbine takes notes.
Also, none said anything about the resource- and crafting systems. I understand that any veteran player do not see the eluding resource problem because they just use their stronger toons to feed the weaker. But for a new-comer this is real. Obviously we agree that crafting is quite uninteresting, it's something we do but it's not particularly fun. Neither did anybody defend the dysfunctional auction houses, hopefully Turbine notices that too.
There were some interesting comments about Lotro becoming good and fun at level 50 and above. What you say effectively supports my conclusions: For a newcomer, Lotro is not the best nor the most fun game. You more or less say that a newcomer should speed-level to 50 and there everything turns great. But my tale was about a newcomers experiences. I know about the variations in quests etcetera that applies higher up. But any player should have a great ride all the way, don't you think?
My thoughts right now are more along the lines: "My own experiences of Lotro look this way. Some guys I do not know state Lotro changes looks and style at level 50 to become a great game. Most of my gaming friends have already switched to other games. Should I continue with Lotro? Or should I switch to some other, more modern game?" Unfortunately my experiences of the first ten months are no better than my original post. The explorer in me likes much of the worlds. The chilling out gamer in me hates the dreadful virtue-deeds, whether slayer or do-75-quests somewhere way below your level. The combateer in me finds challenges but also loads of stuff way below level. The RP in me loves the game and wants to explore the musician system.
Turbine can improve! Lotro has potential! But right now it seems that many players begin to play but leaves after a while. Why? I guess that is the biggest question of them all, why?
You say your enjoying playing the game so what difference does it make if someone else makes a long post stating he does not enjoy it? Did you let an unknown person on the internet convince you to stop eatting at a resturant you enjoy just because they dont like it? The thing about games is that there are a lot of different types and some suit one type of player much more then another. I enjoy playing LOTRO but do not like first person shooters but that does not mean that I feel that people who enjoy fps should stop playing them because I dont like them.
I think you misunderstood. I have little experience and I wasn't making any attempt at being negative towards the OP or LOTRO. The OP shared experience based on *comparisons* to other MMOs. I'm happy with LOTRO. I'm also interested in anything other people think is better. The OP seemed knowledgeable and the review was based on comparisons so . . . it seemed logical to ask what the better MMOs are that LOTRO -- while good -- still didn't quite measure up to. If the other MMOs aren't free to play, I can certainly understand. I expect better quality from pay to play only.
You also stated that you have reached lvl 44 without paying anything. Thats a lot of free play time and maybe now you should consider spending a little money to reward the people who have entertained you for so long. If you do a search you should be able to find a copy of the US version of MoM, Mines of Moria, for less then $20. This will make you vip for 30 days, give you the two prem classes, two more charater slots and access to the Moria quests. With the TP you will earn from being VIP and completing deeds in Moria you should have enough to purchase the Edenwaith quest pack. If you do these you should have no problems making it to lvl 65 where you will need to decide if you want to puchase the Rise of Isenguard expansion or just quests. Twenty dollars should provide you with enough content to keep you entertained for most of the summer if you dont roar through the content.
Ahh -- now that's some good advice I'll probably use. Thanks for the tip.
PS -- I'm still interested in any MMOs that people think are equal or better. I do like variety and choices. Discovering new things is quite fun.
PS -- I'm still interested in any MMOs that people think are equal or better. I do like variety and choices. Discovering new things is quite fun.
Rift and WoW are both "equal or better" than Lotro although some Lotro fans here will deny it. If you never played WoW it is very good - with a very large world to explore. Polished, good PvP and PVE content. Better game mechanics including movement and items/auction/bag space.
Rift also plays very well - good game mechanics (bag space, items, dynamic events, PvP, PvE, working dungeon group finder). Also a very good innovative class system. Lotro has its good points (scenery, lore, Moria, etc.) but I would recommend both games over Lotro. Personally, Lotro gets too tedious, AH and bags don't function that well, no real PvPor dungeon finder to break up grindy PvE. LOTR fanatics and people who can't afford a sub might like it.
GW2 also sounds like it will be very good - SWTOR has gotten mixed reviews. I think those are the main options for major MMOs right now.
As a Founder/Lifetime player I have a decidedly different perspective on things.
This is the kind of player inter-action which LOTRO was DESIGNED around. The concept of "The Fellowship." LOTRO is not a solo game, although it can be soloed. But doing things that way looses a lot of the impact of the game -- especially when supplemented with a useable voice system like Mumble or Ventrillo. (The in-game "Game spy" system "works" but that is all you can say about it. And why should Turbine bother with in-game voice when there are far superior technologies available.)
Must admit, it's voice systems that have finished me with Guilds, even after years of running pretty big ones, and why I now play exclusively solo.
I think they are a very large factor in the general decline of the standard of play in online games in general, and the standard of play in groups, in particular. I will not join a Guild that uses it (nor a group).
There are very good reasons why so many players today, have zero interest in grouping (the appalling lack of gaming skill, driving so many away to soloing, has been caused by far too much that is overpowered being allowed into games, for example, which pretty much negates the need for any skill at all, and which is grossly exacerbated by things like power levelling, and, the use of macro's to automate, to get over the ridiculous quantity of skills that can be accessed, etc). Devs need to pay attention to them.
As for LOTRO, in which soloing is decent enough, I think instances for *some* fellowships (by no means all, and perhaps just for epic stages - and with greatly reduced rewards to allow the quest progression to continue, though there is a case for a few repeatable designs that would probably offer outstanding fun if scaled for solo play - maybe there are some though, but as a new player to LOTRO, I haven't come across them yet) , should be easy enough to tailor the instance difficulty for however many players wish to take part, from 1 to whatever the upper limit is deemed sensible. Fun is what matters of course, and if players are having fun, they stick around, and a few repeatables like this, as adaptations of existing, would not exactly be expensive to implement (which obviously counts).
I played WoW as a beta tester, and never felt attracted to subscribe, because there really was nothing new or special about it, and it made the catastrophic MMO mistake, of turning PvP into Gear vs Gear and overpowered ability vs overpowered ability. The same mistake was made by Rift (a nice ish PvE game I played for quite a while). Also the same mistake was made by AoC which was also a nice ish PvE game. AoC's biggest problem at launch, apart from what were by then MMO serious cultural flaws and baggage, had it be launched with lots of customers with new systems, just when there were serious flaws in some new AMD CPU's, which would crash and play up under game loads, and also coinciding with new Nvidia graphics GPU's, which were flawed, and caused them to crash and play up under game loads too, and a lot of those new machines, had both in them - 'bugs' which were wrongly attributed to the game - the poor devs must have been ripping their hair out. As an aside, I built a lot of cheap new gaming rigs for friends wanting to play AoC, going with tried and tested components with zero issues and good drivers, and none of us had the slightest problem with the game.
As for bags and vault storage and stuff, well, I started off collecting reputation loot, but as soon as the bags filled, that nonsense ended, and I just sell it now. Vault is easy enough to manage too. I have maybe 7 items tops in the house vault, and if I remember right, the vault of my main is at about 23/45.
I don't chase the best in games, though I will optimise within reason, but I refuse point blank to do more than what is 'good enough'. Heck I even regret wasting as much time as I did, trying to get Anniversary horses for all my characters. I certainly won't do that again, and have wasted an hour or so on one character with the present Festival, which is more than enough.
When a game can reward the skills you have acquired, not with phat lootz, but with great experiences, I'll hang in there. I did this with Warhammer Online, for example, when say at level 23 in Tier 3, before the Tier 3 level limit was raised from 32 to 39, I was in the PvP zone with 'average decent' T2 gear still, and got jumped by a fully twinked out level 32, thinking I was easy meat. Whenever we were in the same area after, as soon as he saw me, he literally headed away in the opposite direction as fast as possible(which is REALLY sad! How do you learn to fight better, if you run away from opportunities? But all he had, was reliance on his gear). Once the cap was raised to 39, the Playing Field no longer existed, NOBODY could compete with a level 39 apart from another level 39, and T3 player numbers rapidly collapsed. Needless to say, the game lost my subscription (exactly the same mistakes had already ruined Tier 4).
LOTRO is a PvE MMO. As such, I don't think there's anything that's particularly better, there's a few that are 'ballpark', and a heck of a lot that are worse. Once GW2 launches, I'll be PvP'ing in that mostly (those devs know the score with PvP, but those players addicted to Gear vs Gear and OP ability vs Op ability, will probably hate it), and if the crafted gear stays viable to end game and is 'good enough' at end game, I'll probably stick with it alongside GW2.
eta: as for graphics, gameplay certainly counts for a heck of a lot more than graphics. Today, I find there are far too many games where 'graphics' are substituted for good gameplay, or an excuse for poor gameplay. It doesn't work. LOTRO seems more than adequate in that department.
Last edited by WychHazel; Jun 05 2012 at 10:33 AM.
Rift and WoW are both "equal or better" than Lotro although some Lotro fans here will deny it. If you never played WoW it is very good - with a very large world to explore. Polished, good PvP and PVE content. Better game mechanics including movement and items/auction/bag space.
Rift also plays very well - good game mechanics (bag space, items, dynamic events, PvP, PvE, working dungeon group finder). Also a very good innovative class system. Lotro has its good points (scenery, lore, Moria, etc.) but I would recommend both games over Lotro. Personally, Lotro gets too tedious, AH and bags don't function that well, no real PvPor dungeon finder to break up grindy PvE. LOTR fanatics and people who can't afford a sub might like it.
GW2 also sounds like it will be very good - SWTOR has gotten mixed reviews. I think those are the main options for major MMOs right now.
Rift and WoW are both "equal or better" than Lotro although some Lotro fans here will deny it. If you never played WoW it is very good - with a very large world to explore. Polished, good PvP and PVE content. Better game mechanics including movement and items/auction/bag space.
Rift also plays very well - good game mechanics (bag space, items, dynamic events, PvP, PvE, working dungeon group finder). Also a very good innovative class system. Lotro has its good points (scenery, lore, Moria, etc.) but I would recommend both games over Lotro. Personally, Lotro gets too tedious, AH and bags don't function that well, no real PvPor dungeon finder to break up grindy PvE. LOTR fanatics and people who can't afford a sub might like it.
GW2 also sounds like it will be very good - SWTOR has gotten mixed reviews. I think those are the main options for major MMOs right now.
I had fun in wow. For a long time I played both games but had a falling out with wow customer service (their website messed up a char transfer and they refused to refund it so I stopped paying them). All they had to do was transfer me to the correct server for free, but they wanted to fight about it.
The pvp is the only real difference to me. Well that and the "do not mess up your 80 clicks" skill tree. The bosses and raids? About the same. The general quests and pve? About the same. The auction house? The same. Pvp, and the lack of it, is a big draw for me to LOTRO --- I got really tired of the pvp attitude in wow where people were killing lowbies, killing low level npcs so you could not quest, etc -- dumb stuff that got old after, you know, 5 years or so of it. Anyway a big class of your LOTRO players that like it better are those of us who find pvp (not the fighting itself, but the hateful behaviors) to be uncool. It is an amazing drawing factor for a lot of people.
I did casual wow pvp before they added the special gear with resilliance or whatever the word was, and added the arena junk. That turned pvp into a grind where you lose 10000000 games to get the gear until you could compete. They ruined the casual pvp with that move. I quit in whichever expansion added the death knight, so it was all long ago...
Draegon:
"stack all the morale you want but dont come on here wonderin why you aint hittin hard! "
The Mines of Moria tip led me in a good direction. I've decided to get the Mithril edition instead ($20 at Gamestop -- which I'd never heard of before). The 2000TP that come with it will get most (all?) of the MoM benefits other than the VIP. I think.
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Many other virtue-deeds require mindless slaughter of several hundreds of certain mobs, unrelated to quests or storyline, and some which exist only at certain locations and also then in small numbers (as if the devs don't know spawn rates and such stuff). Sorry, all that cr#p is rooted in an obsolete game-methodology which was aged already when Lotro was developed. This is not fun nor challenging, just tiresome.
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