Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
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ESRB:
Blood,Suggestive Themes,Use of Alcohol,Use of Tobacco,Violence
Publisher: Electronic Arts Genre(s): MMORPG Home Page: http://www.warhammeronline.com/
The Bad
While the visuals are "good enough", there are some issues - mostly with uneven animations and slightly underwhelming spell effects. Shadows are also limited to simple blobs around everyone else except your own character.
It's hard to quantify this issue - the game just feels a tad "sticky" reacting to your spells and abilities. It could be that I just need to get used to a slightly different system after too much World of Warcraft, but somehow the gameplay feels just a tad "off". Could be related to the NPC movement issues (see below).
I sincerely hope that Mythic can somehow get the server populations balanced. Since RvR is everywhere, it's no fun to play on a server where one side outnumbers the other by 3 to 1 or worse. In fact, I hereby predict that Warhammer Online will live or die depending on how Mythic can keep the servers fun and balanced. Right now it seems that a clear majority is piling up on the dark side, playing Chaos, Greenskins or Dark Elves - that's what you get when Warhammer has always been promoted with images of grumpy orcs with crude shields and swords...
When Mythic made the call that GOA would take care of the European operations for Warhammer Online, every DAOC subscriber who had played on GOA's DAOC servers immediately cringed in terror. GOA already made a big mess out of the Open Beta, has fumbled around with press keycodes and otherwise looked like a bunch of amateurs. Supposedly Mythic has taken interest after the failures we saw earlier this week, and they are "working hard" with GOA to make sure the launch will go smoothly also in Europe. I believe it when I see it... The Ugly
Warhammer Online suffers from the "skating effect" that also plagued Lord of the Rings Online and Age of Conan. The character models often just don't move as if their feet actually connect with the ground. While your own character moves mostly right, NPCs often stutter and slide around. There are also some NPC pathing issues, which leads me to...
The only major bug I've seen so far is when monsters decide that they can't be attacked - and sometimes they still attack you back while you can't touch them due to the anti-cheese code thinking that you are somehow trying to exploit the pathing code. This is not a showstopper bug - you can still play just fine, but it's highly annoying, especially when a named quest-specific monster decides to bug out. Mythic has acknowledged that this is the biggest outstanding issue, and the latest patch (that just went up on the EU servers today) is supposed to help mend it. Preliminary Verdict: Definitely Worth TryingOverall, while I personally don't think Blizzard is going to instantly lose their customer base to Warhammer Online, it's definitely the first credible competitor in the market since Lord of the Rings Online. It's not perfect, and it's impossible to say anything definite about the "endgame" just yet. Still, a lot of effort has been put towards polish and details, and the package just feels like a fun game. It also has a good two-month opening before Blizzard retaliates with Wrath of the Lich King. Besides, competition is always good. Sometimes it feels like the whole MMO genre has been treading water for the past four years. We'll give our definite verdict on Warhammer Online later this month when the launch dust has settled and a clearer picture emerges. Until then - a tentative thumbs up, with some reservations related to the NPC pathing/skating problems and potential RvR balance issues. Free Trial?If you are interested in giving the game a try, do note that the Open Beta is just about over - the servers are going to be wiped tomorrow. The head start for Collectors Edition owners starts on Sunday 14th of September - and those have been sold out for a while now. Standard Edition customers get in on Tuesday 16th of September in the US and Oceania, while GOA has announced that Standard Edition head start for EU would begin on Monday 15th of September, a day earlier than in the US. Unfortunately as the beta is about over, there is no other free trials available and the only way to try at the moment is to buy the game. To participate in these "head starts" you also need a preorder code. The easiest way is probably to buy the game in digital form from EA's Online Store or Direct2Drive - and make sure you get the right version - EU copies can only play on the EU servers while US copies are good only for the US servers. Alternatively you can try to hunt down a store that still has some preorder boxes around. Actual retail boxes will be on the shelves on Thursday, 18th of September. The game box is priced at $49.95 / €49.95 with one free month, and monthly subscription fees are as follows;
US: 14.99$/month, $41.97/3 months, $77.94/6 months Game Cards should also be available after launch.
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