After years of Dominance, WoW is loosing whole guilds of people at a time! To a still relatively unknown game called RIFT! No billboards. No commercials. Yet still it is attracting MMORPGer's! Can this game of RIFT's become number 1? Will WoW endure to its last planned expansion? Or will only the Die hards remain like in Sony's Everquest? I Leave it to you The Gamers, the Trollers, and the Main Fan Base to DECIDE!
RIFT vs WOW Debate! If you've played both Jump on in!
- Thread starter Alice81
- Start date
Er...Rift is quite openly trying to steal players from WoW, so i don't know how you get "No billboards, no commercials". We're not in Azeroth anymore. 
I actually got RIFT on sale on Steam yesteday, and so far from what I've played I really like it (level 14 right now). I also played it when it was on beta, but it was released right when DA2 came out, and I decided to get DA2 instead(what a mistake that was).
I have not played WoW though, so I don't have a point of comparision, but I have played a few MMO's (most of which are like WoW) and I think mechanically speaking RIFT is the most solid of them.
I have not played WoW though, so I don't have a point of comparision, but I have played a few MMO's (most of which are like WoW) and I think mechanically speaking RIFT is the most solid of them.
I think it more along the lines of Rift being better than WoW... That and multiple free trial weekends and recruit a friend stuff (Probably helps that it was advertised on WoW fansites)
I mean, when people talk about it they say "It's like WoW when it was still good"
I mean, when people talk about it they say "It's like WoW when it was still good"
Ive played wow for nearly 4 years now and am proud of it, but rift is simply better, yes it rips of wow at every turn but as our very own loud mouth english man put it "dont fix what isnt broke" and thats what rift has done, taken the elements from wow that people love, spiced it up with a few new things, improved the graphics engine and booted it out the door, or thats what i would be saying if it wassn't for the attention to detail in rift, the game as a whole is solid dont get me wrong, but its the little details that make it special, the fact that some races use their staff as a walking stick when the do they're walk animation or that the elf /..Big guys? racial lets to fly/jump onto roof tops to get the advantage or that casting a different spell actually feels different (Due mostly to each type of spell having a different animation) little things like that.
Well, Rift was advertised on Wowhead, which is what I used for WoW information when I played it, and I think it still is.
Regardless, no, WoW will not die, end of. If I had to choose though, I'd still play WoW, Rift, I felt, was a little too clunky, and there's little to no end-game content at the moment. Plus the Class system is really, REALLY imbalanced. Want to play a Dual wielding warrior with elemental abilities? Too bad the combination sucks balls.
Anyway, aren't versus threads frowned upon here? I read that in the rules somewhere, though it's been a while since I checked. I probably should get round to checking again.
Regardless, no, WoW will not die, end of. If I had to choose though, I'd still play WoW, Rift, I felt, was a little too clunky, and there's little to no end-game content at the moment. Plus the Class system is really, REALLY imbalanced. Want to play a Dual wielding warrior with elemental abilities? Too bad the combination sucks balls.
Anyway, aren't versus threads frowned upon here? I read that in the rules somewhere, though it's been a while since I checked. I probably should get round to checking again.
...? Personally I've never seen a video game advertised on a billboard. Pictures yes, so I know it is done but not the actual board.
Its a friendly discussion about gaming weather you call it one thing or something else why would that change? I may be new here as of last night. but i dont see the difference in talking about characteristics about one game and another what ever the thread may be called.
How is this a friendly discussion when you ask for trollers in your OP?Alice81 said:
Rift is a high res copy of wow with all the charm, humor, and blizzard quality support stripped away.
I don't play either anymore but I don't support a game that advertises by openly throwing dirt on another game.
Also rift has tons of commercials...they were all over tv and the escapist.
Well, I played RIFT from very early beta all the way through the first month of release. It's a good game, it really is. However, I got into playing it because I was looking for something to replace WoW with. The place where RIFT come up short was that it was just a nicely polished game that was too similar to WoW to really stand apart.
There are a few differences in the way talents are handled and the actual "rifts" themselves. In the end though, it just doesn't break away from WoW enough to be a viable alternative for someone who already has been invested in WoW since Vanilla and has 5 lvl 85 toons, 1 lvl 83 toon, 3 lvl 80 toons, and a lvl 72 toon.
Bottom line is you're not going to find much in RIFT (outside of the unique talent system and the rift world events) that isn't being done better and in a more polished fashion already in WoW.
There are a few differences in the way talents are handled and the actual "rifts" themselves. In the end though, it just doesn't break away from WoW enough to be a viable alternative for someone who already has been invested in WoW since Vanilla and has 5 lvl 85 toons, 1 lvl 83 toon, 3 lvl 80 toons, and a lvl 72 toon.
Bottom line is you're not going to find much in RIFT (outside of the unique talent system and the rift world events) that isn't being done better and in a more polished fashion already in WoW.
Its interesting to see the Evolution of Online Gaming. Ive been into MMO's since the early days of Everquest. (yes im old) Ive seen some games flop others stick around despite the overwhelming presence of a giant! But here we are at a transition. It seems people want something different. Now WOW did revamp their whole game with this last expansion, but was that enough? RIFT offers something new in game play and with talent trees. Hmmmmm.
Nautical Honors Society- Trollers is a term for people in MMORPG of very opinionated people. As a gamer its only natural to invite them to a thread where they would come anyways. I really dont see the need to nit pick and try to find something wrong. If your a gamer of MMORPG"s you know what This thread is about and join in and share a opinion.
Public Grouping was a great addition to Rift. It shouldn't be hard to play with other people on an MMO.
I quit WoW before Cataclysm came out. Upon my return, I re-rolled two characters (Since my absence led to a complete hijacking of my account). I grouped with very few people on my way to the top. Rift let me click a button so I could fend off hordes of enemies destroying a nearby town with a group of random people all flinging their shiny spells about.
However, I got bored of Rift really fast. By the time I hit 20, I was still in the same area, and I got tired of seeing the same landscape. I know it takes a level of dedication, but I couldn't find myself putting in the effort.
Also, the class system is significantly better (Especially now, since you can only go up on talent tree at a time in WoW). My Elementalist/Warlock/Necromancer class was a lot more fun then my Priest.
As of right now, I don't play either. At the risk of sounding cliche', I miss Vanilla WoW, as I think it was superior to both. But these are days long gone, and my quest for a complicated, adventure filled MMO have been long abandoned.
Maybe I'll go play Eve
I quit WoW before Cataclysm came out. Upon my return, I re-rolled two characters (Since my absence led to a complete hijacking of my account). I grouped with very few people on my way to the top. Rift let me click a button so I could fend off hordes of enemies destroying a nearby town with a group of random people all flinging their shiny spells about.
However, I got bored of Rift really fast. By the time I hit 20, I was still in the same area, and I got tired of seeing the same landscape. I know it takes a level of dedication, but I couldn't find myself putting in the effort.
Also, the class system is significantly better (Especially now, since you can only go up on talent tree at a time in WoW). My Elementalist/Warlock/Necromancer class was a lot more fun then my Priest.
As of right now, I don't play either. At the risk of sounding cliche', I miss Vanilla WoW, as I think it was superior to both. But these are days long gone, and my quest for a complicated, adventure filled MMO have been long abandoned.
Maybe I'll go play Eve
Played Rift when it was free to play for a weekend.
Rift is not ashamed to steal everything from WoW. (And I don't mean the general idea, I mean detailed stuff like launcher, skills, interface, even the options menu's structure and much much more)
It is less polished looking, casting spells feels wrong.
The areas are less crowded / mob-populated than WoW. (Which is bad, because no one wants to be in an empty world)
Rifts are fun, at least the first few times, but it already seemed to become a HUGE giant boring farm.
The skills are sometimes "confusing" to say the very least. My two friends and I all had some spells from different "talent trees" or "schools" that were exactly the same, only that one was simply objectively better.
(Like: Energy cost 10 Hit enemy for 10 physical damage. And another spell that was like: Energy cost 10 Hit enemy for 15 fire damage.)
We had an incredible imbalance in kill speed, some classes really seem to perform way better than others.
We only played it one evening and got to level 12-16 or so. Never started it again. It just seemed like a worse version of WoW. (Once again)
Rift is not ashamed to steal everything from WoW. (And I don't mean the general idea, I mean detailed stuff like launcher, skills, interface, even the options menu's structure and much much more)
It is less polished looking, casting spells feels wrong.
The areas are less crowded / mob-populated than WoW. (Which is bad, because no one wants to be in an empty world)
Rifts are fun, at least the first few times, but it already seemed to become a HUGE giant boring farm.
The skills are sometimes "confusing" to say the very least. My two friends and I all had some spells from different "talent trees" or "schools" that were exactly the same, only that one was simply objectively better.
(Like: Energy cost 10 Hit enemy for 10 physical damage. And another spell that was like: Energy cost 10 Hit enemy for 15 fire damage.)
We had an incredible imbalance in kill speed, some classes really seem to perform way better than others.
We only played it one evening and got to level 12-16 or so. Never started it again. It just seemed like a worse version of WoW. (Once again)
I've played both and the case is being overstated. RIFT is doing an above average game for an MMO right now, but it's hardly spectacular. I have an active account and a character of like level 21 since I have been playing other games. In a little less than a month I've seen substantial fluctuation in the player base, and apparently from the chatter in higher level zones there are issues with the whole "RIFT" mechanic the game is based around rendering the game borderline unplayable at times since there just aren't enough players around to have the nessicary numbers of groups to constantly fight off the RIFTs as the game requires. This means that entire towns and quest hubs get eaten and the situation leads to increasing player annoyance, etc... along with me noticing the number of players, it's also noteworthy that RIFT is offering special promotional deals to try and get people to play. For example STEAM right now is offering a special pack.Alice81 said:
Now, you are correct that WoW is losing players, my guild is one of the ones that collapsed with a lot of the players leaving. I think a lot of them are just stopping MMOs all together for the moment, and those that aren't are divided between a number of differant games. RIFT like a few others like Aion attracting and keeping WoW players and thus staying successful enough where it doesn't seem likely that will be going "Free to play" any time soon, but your hardly seeing anything like a major exodus.
RIFT is by no means a bad game, but it's not the WoW-killer of prophecy. Really, right now all you can say is that WoW's player base has notable decreased, it's by no means in any trouble. According to some things I've been reading they've lost about 500k accounts from their core first world market, which is about 12.5% of their core player base by many accounts. Some have gone as high as them losing 20% but I don't think that's the case. It's important to understand the differance between the core player base, and their overall player base. WoW might claim something like 15 million players, but as people have pointed out for years a lot of those players are in Asia. Despite the huge number of players and how those millions amount to a lot of the sales, the meat of the game's revenue comes from the western first world. Remember back when WoW was in a slap fight with China over changing the client firm it was providing the game through, along with comments about how much money was allowed to leave the Chinese economy, and so on? (not to mention little facts like how undead are banned in China, so Blizzard had to re-do the entire Forsaken section of the game to turn them into like ugly humans), that kind of stuff not to mention how much money people can spend on leisure makes those markets secondary despite the sheer number of people. Enough money to justify the time and trouble, but definatly not their core market.
The loss of 500k people from the core market is only noteworthy because it's WoW most other games have seen that kind of drop off long before now.
How accurate the sources I heard this from is debatable, but it seems to match what I'm actually seeing.
We aren't likely to see a situation where WoW takes a major hit, or winds up like the original Everquest until "Old Republic Online" comes out. Even then it's debatable, because we have no idea if ORO will be the predicted success. Oddly I find it unusual that Bioware/EA is denying that the game had a 300+ million dollar price tag when that's arguably one of the things that helped cement it's "this could very well kill WoW" reputation. When you look at things like that, it does create a few niggling doubts.
Right now I think the player drop off is also because EA was screaming "Q2 2011" from the rooftops not too long ago, and a lot of people are expecting ORO to be released soon. One of the things that could very well wind up hurting ORO is it simply taking too long and too many annoucements followed by delays. After all I expect that a lot of this core player base that WoW apparently lost is going to get involved in something else if we don't have a solid release date soon at the very least (and that being within a couple of months), and those people are unlikely to just drop what they are involved in to go to ORO.
Kind of irrelevent to the situation, but as much as I tend to support the "take as long as you need to do it right" approach to MMO and game design, I think ORO's dev cycle and what annoucements we've seen is hurting it. Honestly, I think if ORO fails the big lesson to be learned is that you shouldn't even annouce that a product is being developed until you have a decent idea of when your going to be done. This game has been "going to be released any month now" for like three years, and to be blunt it's upsetting more people than building anticipation.
Still, RIFT is quite bluntly a game most people will tell you they plan to "drop like a hot rock" when ORO or (if that fails) something like Blizzard's upcoming project launches. I mostly just kill a few minutes with it here and there when I get an MMO itch, as I said I'm only level 21 and I probably could have maxxed a character easily by now if I was all that invested in it. I mostly just ride around and kill a few things now and again, it being an MMO I'm a member of, just to have an MMO I'm not burned out on.
NONE of this means RIFT is a bad game, nothing even close to that, it's just not an "OMG" blockbuster. All told it's pretty average. It's big claims to fame being the RIFT mechanic which is as much an annoyance as an advantage at times, since it occasionally makes the game unplayable, and it's fairly unique take on characters which lets everyone be multi-classed with three differant self contained character types to pick abillities from at any given moment.
... oh and this is a long post, but right now I half expect the next big blockbuster MMO if ORO fails is actually going to be a Pokemon MMO by Nintendo. There have always been rumors, but recently I've been hearing that there has actually been one under development for over two years now, but Nintendo didn't want to say anything official until it had some idea when it was going to be done. Allegedly according to the chatter, while working on the engine, the game is till in an alpha stage because the fundemental Pokemon format doesn't work perfectly with an MMO, and right now they are tinkering with the idea of removing Pokeballs from the equasion other than capturing and having the player travel with up to 4 pokemon as a party "always out" similar to games like "Star Trek Online" or what "Gods and Heroes" tried, but they are getting mixed responses from a limited audience that was shown parts of the game because it winds up looking almost nothing like Pokemon and the one on one fighting, and pokeball fetishism. Not to mention the whole issue of what role if any they trainer is going to play, apparently in the current alpha build it's a lot like a pet class in some other games and can support with buffs and various debuff and DOT attacks on the enemies. The source for all of this? Apparently some people have been claiming (in places like game chat) that Nintendo had a survey service in Joyopolis around the site of the upcoming "Ace Attorney" attraction in Japan and where pulling people out of the crowd, having them sign non-disclosure wavors, and then showing them vidoes of gameplay footage and various possible game concepts, and then having them fill out surveys on what they think. Of course according to these sources everything is also in Japanese and it's unknown if they are even considering a western release.
I say I half expect that this might be the next big one if I'm right, and of course assuming ORO fails, simply because this is at least an MMO with a huge possible fan base. Blizzard's "Project Titan" by many reports might not even be a real MMORPG, but rather some kind of persistant world shooter like what "War Rock" tried which means it's hardly going to be scratching the itch of this basic player base.