While release is next Tue, people who pre-ordered may get access this Fri. That said its not certain and depends on how long its takes for them to let in all the people who pre-ordered it before you. Their rep told me today that they do guaranty two things though; 1. That if you pre-order you get to play at least by Monday (24 hour head-start). 2. That you get an email by this Friday telling you when your head-start begins.
FYI đ
Yep I have done it. I left the blog and got down to business with a 15 hour run over the weekend through The Secret World. I managed to run through most of Solomon Island’s Kingsmouth and part of the Savage Coast. I also experienced some with the Polaris Dungeon.
Overall – I learned a ton about the game. I had a lot of pretty misleading ideas about TSW and over the weekend I tried to address my concerns while having fun. Bottom line, before I even start with my review, is that it has a few traditional issues (e.g. with the questing system), but it also has some intriguing charm that made me stick to it for that many hours. And then when I realized its releasing over this upcoming weekend I pre-ordered it today. I may not keep my subscription, but the weekend was enough to convince me that its worth my initial month. I HEREBY  RECOMMEND TO YOU ALL TO BUY TSW. If you are interested in my revised review please continue after the cut.
We learned today that GW2 will embrace us with 4 hours of fun next Wednesday, June 27th, starting 1pm EST. I will not be able to log at that time, but I bet most of you are already making plans for a lengthy lunch break đ
You can follow the ANet blog link for the details:Â http://www.arena.net/blog/help-us-stress-our-servers-on-june-27. “All we need you to do is log in and have funâleave the stress to us!”
Well I have been thinking. I got a lot of feedback on the fact that I might have judged TSW too quickly. I will dive into it again this weekend. This time with potentially two friends, for which Funcom extended beta keys as well. I will also try to get to the Polaris dungeon with them. It may be that although traditional questing is boring for me in the way its implementated in TSW, dungeons may yet prove worthy of my sub.
But the question is what if TSW will become a no-go again. I am currently thinking that after eliminating D3 and Tera, I have to consider the new DDO expansion. Will see. What is your pass time till GW2?
I posted few weeks ago about how D3 is a good pass time. And it was. In the early days while working out the normal levels I found D3 to be entertaining and rewarding. Then came the nightmare level and the game became a chore. After reading yesterday’s GW2 blog about “fun” playing, I realized that D3 just wasn’t designed for my kind of fun. Please let me explain after the cut.
Recommending the latest GW2 blog post by Colin Johanson. Here is a small paragraph about how items will not get you more powerful:
“Fun impacts loot collection. The rarest items in the game are not more powerful than other items, so you donât need them to be the best. The rarest items have unique looks to help your character feel that sense of accomplishment, but itâs not required to play the game. We donât need to make mandatory gear treadmills, we make all of it optional, so those who find it fun to chase this prestigious gear can do so, but those who donât are just as powerful and get to have fun too.”
Just a humble opinion based on my recent run with TSW. I love the way they publish new pre-made decks recently and I like the way you can test them in-game before going out to combat. But I think that there is still one component missing which is an AI that would take a look at your selected skills / deck and give you an automatic feedback. It shouldn’t be too fancy and I don’t see it being a big issue to implement. Basically the same guidelines and considerations that make the more proficient players grade a deck could be applied here as well. E.g. the AI could grade your deck lower based on whether skills don’t combine well – like using different types of resources. But I am sure that the dev team can really shine here with more options and ideas. People could still use whatever deck they want, but an AI grading your deck from a pure technical perspective, is a great way to bring new comers up to speed. Also it could be so cool to allow the community to come up with some scripts to evaluate decks! What do you think?
TOR is about to go F2P for levels 1 to 15 next month. For some this is surprising but not for me. Its all about maximizing revenue and past their initial launch it was evident that the only barrier that prevented BioWare from taking the right business decision was pride!
Recently we have been seeing a big change across the industry regarding in game cash stores and what micro transactions offer. Leading the pack is now probably D3. But we have also seen GW2 coming up with a bit of controversial plan. It was pretty anticipated given the shift to F2P and in this post I will try to give you my perspective on the matter. Please join me after the cut.
I really respect ArenaNet for releasing the game “when its ready”. And the amount of effort they have put into this MMO is evident to anyone who fiddled with the beta. But as time moves forward, months soon from the point where we pre-purchased, with 2 BWE marks on our belt, and especially a sense that the game is almost flawless by some of us after the latest beta weekend … I am beginning to think that its counterproductive for ArenaNet not to have a release date by now. My point is that hype and community spotlight is something that peaks and may be harder now to maintain. I have no doubt that the game will be / is already the game that will lead the pack for the next few years. But what ANet needs now  is a release date, and something for the fans to hang on to in order to maintain the hype and lead to even bigger revenues.
Just my 2cp. Do you think GW2 is ready? Do you think its ready enough for a release date?
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