The Surprising Things About Elder Scrolls Online

[Shamus Young]

The Surprising Things About Elder Scrolls Online

I've sunk a few days into the game and leveled several different characters through the various starting areas. Now that I've had a chance to try it for myself, I'm actually surprised. I was all set to hate this thing, but it's not at all what I was expecting.

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[Ne1butme]

The Surprising Things About Elder Scrolls Online

Publishers have been throwing good teams at bad ideas, mindlessly copying World of Warcraft without actually understanding what made WoW a success.

Shamus - What did WOW do that made it a success? That sentence seems to indicate that the WOW secret sauce can be understood by savvy developers if they only try harder.

 

[endtherapture]

I'm glad someone enjoyed it but I personally found it one of the most boring games I had played in my life. No motivation to continue playing at all.

 

[Shamus Young]

The Surprising Things About Elder Scrolls Online

Publishers have been throwing good teams at bad ideas, mindlessly copying World of Warcraft without actually understanding what made WoW a success.

Shamus - What did WOW do that made it a success? That sentence seems to indicate that the WOW secret sauce can be understood by savvy developers if they only try harder.

That is a huge question. "What made WoW a success?" could be the subject of a whole series of articles. Some of it was gameplay. Some of it was marketing and brand recognition. Some of it was just being lucky. Some of it was classic network effects leading to critical mass.

And their long-term success happened for different reasons than their initial success.

The point isn't really that there is a "secret sauce". The point was that you shouldn't copy the most superficial aspects of WoW (hotbars and questgivers with ! over their heads) and expect to have a game that's as engrossing as WoW.

 

[Mortuorum]

My level of excitement for ESO over time looks something like a cardiac sinus rhythm... up, down, up, down. I'm not sure my own heart can take it.

Still, this (and the other preview articles released today) make me optimistic. The only MMO that's really stuck with me over the years is Champions Online; maybe ESO will be the second? (At least until I get sick of paying the monthly subscription.)

 

[SoranMBane]

Huh, I've never really enjoyed MMOs, but that all actually sounds like this game could be an exception... If it wasn't for that price tag. The $60 upfront I could maybe deal with if the game has enough content to justify it, but I wouldn't pay a $15 a month subscription fee even if this was bound to be the greatest RPG experience in the history of RPGs.

 

[martyrdrebel27]

Drop that 15 down to 5, or make it 15 for two months. Its the right thing to do. We accept 15 as the standard monthly payment because of wow's fees, but in all honesty, that can't be even close to the minimum it would cost to support the servers. Drop the price per month equals success.

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

I'm proud to say that (without any coaching for me!) my AI companion got spiked by every single one of them - even ones you could easily just walk around. It really felt like I was running tombs in Skyrim with a brain-dead companion, listening to her yelp in pain as she staggered from one obvious trap to the next. Maybe I wasn't supposed to find that section funny, but I did.

It's odd that you like the game for how 'dysfunctional' it is. Even this decent overview does the opposite of inspiring confidence.

On a related note, what you say mirrors an RPS write-up that just came out also, but they find every single one of these points detrimental, leading to the opposite conclusion. Link here: (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/02/07/hands-on-the-first-few-hours-of-elder-scrolls-online/)

 

[Souplex]

ES: O's three faction system reminds me of your Warhammer Online article a while back where you pointed out that two-faction PVP is inherently broken, because one side starts winning, and keeps getting bigger and stronger as a result.
I'm surprised that didn't get a token mention in your article.

 

[Dollabillyall]

I'm also in the beta and I have an opposite experience with the companion AI than you do. I avoided the traps and so did my AI companion, so it might just be a bug or something.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

It's that fifteen dollars a month that it going to be the make or break for me. I will probably try this game out for a month, maybe two, but unless I am totally floored by it, I don't think I'll be paying more than ninety dollars for the game.

 

[Lightknight]

I've sunk a few days into the game and leveled several different characters through the various starting areas. Now that I've had a chance to try it for myself, I'm actually surprised. I was all set to hate this thing, but it's not at all what I was expecting.

Hmm, I thought the first rule of Beta club was not to talk about Beta club?

Are reviewers like yourself getting to review the game now or is the non-disclosure still in effect?

Either way, I agree with your article. This has very pleasantly surprised me and that's all I'll say for now.

 

[mythgraven]

I cant help but feel that for whatever merits ESO may have in its favor, the collective opinion of the internet has already sealed its fate. I doubt people will give this game the chance it deserves, because even Forbes is piling onto the "Lets Hate ESO" bandwagon. (or, maybe, banned-wagon?)

I get a similar feeling/taste from the MMO market in general. I believe WoW succeeded where it did, because of WHEN it did. When Vanilla/BC came out, MMO's were made mainstream enough to be considered, and the players (Eternal trolls and griefers aside) seemed to enjoy playing -with other people-, and this is the "secret sauce", adventure and companionship... Players today do not want interaction beyond the bare minimum to achieve end-game gear.

Gamers no longer play MMO's to play with other people, they play them to use other people. Be it for ego boosting, frustration venting, or content-locusting, people no longer have any desire to form a bond with other people in the digital landscape. Its a culture shift, and one I feel is going to doom the genre. (Dooooooooommmmm!!!)

I feel that people will stop bothering to log in to games that enhance/encourage player segregation/detachment. There are enough single player games out there, and with the audience no longer wanting to sit together... It's really only a matter of time.

 

[reaper_94]

I salute you for not being afraid to change your stance on the game after having had a hands-on experience.

I still see people complaining about how the game looks/plays like it's straight out of 2004...

 

[RedDeadFred]

Wow, I normally hate MMOs and by the sounds of it, this does away with a lot of the things that annoy me about them.

However, I am never going to pay a subscription fee so I am not even considering getting this unless it moves to some other business model.

 

[Adeptus Aspartem]

TESO does many things right but in the end it's still just another MMO. If you've played WoW, Tera, Aion or anything else you've played TESO too.

1. The "huge" variety of skills.
Yes, you basically can combine everything you want BUT can you actually play them? What could be tested so far were the first 20 levels. No high levels and no end game content.
And while you can durdle around with sub-par characters in a singleplayer game to have your fun you definitly can't in a multiplayer game.
Your build is fun but lacks punch? You won't find a group. You will die in PvP. Farmin will take you twice the amount of everyone else.
Thus the amount of builds will be greatly reduced in the end, im 100% sure of that. Just look at Diablos rune system.

2. It's just another "theme-park" MMO.
You go to questhub A, do every quest and get railroaded to questhub B. Rince repeat.
Sofar i couldn't expirience any exploration of any sort.
Again, if you've played any other MMO you know the drill.

3. The quest are a 50/50 thing. Some include a certain role-playing with choices you've to make. But sofar i couldn't see any consequences. Yes a guard my greet you with "saviour of blabla" but that's about it - maybe there's more to that later on but sofar, zilch.
And the other quests are the usual MMO-grind stuff with 50 people running around in the same small area waiting for stuff to respawn so they can kill it.
TES-feeling = 0

If Zenimax told me, that the stage the game is in is early Beta and it won't be released until end of the year i'd say: Wow! They're onto something.
But seeing as they want to toss it out in a few months? I doubt it's gonna have any sucses.
Apart from design choices it's still pretty buggy.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Attack magic are staffs, its kinda dumb I miss having spells. Auto aim is forced and well its mostly a mindless button mashing mess ala any MMO out there.

 

[elilupe]

I'm so conflicted here. Who do I believe in their verdict of ESO: Shamus Young, one of my favorite game critics, or Rockpapershotgun, my favorite gaming site(sorry, Escapist)?
Shamus says the quests are well written and interesting, RPS says they're boring drivel.
Shamus says there is an interesting non-hotbar combat system, RPS says the exact opposite.

WHAT DO I DO?! WHO DO I BELIEVE!?

 

[Mistwraithe]

LOL.

It's a quandary alright. My impression is that Shamus is being slightly generous in his review, either to contrast with last week's article or because as he said he can see some nice touches and hopes they are successful which will require some decent reviews.

Meanwhile RPS seem to be criticising ESO most for NOT being a WoW clone. I got the distinct impression that the reviewer would have preferred more combat and less 'boring' talking. I can sort of see where he is coming from if the writing is terrible but at the same time that is akin to saying he wants more hack and slay and less role playing! That makes it a review I struggle to relate to.

Either way I doubt I have the time to play it. But is sounds mildly promising.

 

[Vrach]

The Surprising Things About Elder Scrolls Online

Publishers have been throwing good teams at bad ideas, mindlessly copying World of Warcraft without actually understanding what made WoW a success.

Shamus - What did WOW do that made it a success? That sentence seems to indicate that the WOW secret sauce can be understood by savvy developers if they only try harder.

That is a huge question. "What made WoW a success?" could be the subject of a whole series of articles. Some of it was gameplay. Some of it was marketing and brand recognition. Some of it was just being lucky. Some of it was classic network effects leading to critical mass.

And their long-term success happened for different reasons than their initial success.

The point isn't really that there is a "secret sauce". The point was that you shouldn't copy the most superficial aspects of WoW (hotbars and questgivers with ! over their heads) and expect to have a game that's as engrossing as WoW.

One thing to be kept in mind about WoW's "secret sauce" is its innovation/polish compared to the time period. When WoW hit (and honestly, for a good long while after), it worked and was fun. However, what made it great before does not make it great now because the gameplay that was acceptable back then is not the gameplay that's acceptable right now.

You want an MMO that'll make money? Make one with gameplay that doesn't feel like it belongs in the last decade. And not even the latter part of it. Moreover, make one with gameplay that doesn't mirror WoW's. I mean, if you want to mirror WoW's gameplay, at least get it a little up to date. Dragon Age uses a similar system, but doesn't feel nearly as dated to me as WoW or it's copies.

But as I said, why not try something else? MMOFPS - make a giant Battlefield game. PvP can be what Battlefield already is, for PvE you could have squads of people assaulting an enemy army base or fortified positions (with a pile of possible objectives inside). The potential for PvE there is so ridiculously huge, nothing anyone's ever done and the lack of it is astonishing. Old Battlefield games have shown you can play a 64 player map with bots, so basically, 10 years ago, we had the technology to make a game where a raid consisting of 20 players could take on a map that had 44 bots at one time.

MMORPG? Do what TESO tried, but don't suck at it (I sat down with it and was bored within 10 minutes. Huge TES fan, this does not remotely do it justice). Seriously, if modders can make a normal TES game function with other people, there's no excuse for actual paid developers not to be up to the task. Get that combat more interesting than hotbar crap or ridiculously stiff whacking.