[MUD-Dev2] [OFF-TOPIC] A rant against Vanguard reviews and rants

[Amanda Walker]

On Mar 9, 2007, at 6:16 PM, Dana V. Baldwin wrote:
> Damion Schubert wrote:
>> This was very similar to the way that Dungeons and Dragons Online
>> approached structuring their world and gameplay.  One of the constant
>> complaints about the game was how it didn't FEEL like a true virtual
>> world.
> It reminded me instantly of Guild Wars. It seems to have also had more
> success there than it did in DDO, perhaps because they (correctly)
> shunned the MMO title.

I've come around 180 degrees on Guild Wars, after playing it some.   
Regardless of what they call it, I think It's as much an MMO as, say,  
WoW.  It fits a central playstyle I've seen in most other MMOs: use  
towns to buy & sell stuff and socialize, and then go out on quests  
with small groups.  It may be the extreme case (the entire world is  
instanced *except* towns, with PvP in arenas), but it clearly fills  
the same ecological niche as WoW/EQ/etc.  I also think it has the  
best execution of a story arc (three of them so far) of any MMO out  
there (though Burning Crusade gives it a run for its money). For  
someone soloing or playing with the same group most times, it's a lot  
of fun (more appealing than the "running molten core every week" that  
high level WoW had become by the time BC was released).

You can see this same variation in non-combat virtual worlds.  For  
chatworlds, consider IMVU vs. There; in SL, "private islands" are  
more appealing to many people than the "mainland".

I suspect this is, at least in part, a response to griefing.


Amanda Walker