Tombatal Reviews: Star Wars The Old Republic - Light Side, Part 2

Rift preview and problems with their online advertisements

So if you've never heard of Rift, it seems to be the next new MMORPG coming out and a lot of people are getting pumped about it...  for some reason.  Many claim that this will finally be the MMO that tops the colossus known as: World of Warcraft.  Now, not to sound jaded here, but.. you're serious, right?  I've been playing World of Warcraft since it came out, since it was being advertised on the Warcraft III main page and I can tell you that it just isn't happening.  No, it isn't.  I've seen a lot of contenders that have came out and they've all failed or at the best, founded their own place and player base and happily are surviving in WoW's shadow.

So, what is it that Rift has that is different from World of Warcraft?  I'm no expert because I haven't payed too much attention to it, I've seen trailers, the main webpage and a short play-through of the game and I haven't seen too much really.  They have a talent system that allows you to turn into another class, a two faction based rivalry and finally the rifts themselves of their namesake that will open up and continuously spew monsters until players clean it up - ala Warhammer Online's public quests.  Honestly, I don't see any innovation here and believe me, I'd like to see something new and thriving in the MMORPG market.

But, it's simply isn't the game Rift and that is because it's trying to directly compete with WoW and that game is so large now that it probably doesn't even know what Rift is.  They probably brought up a meeting about what to do against Rift and they probably sat there in silence for a few moments before a simultaneously burst of laughter was heard and then they went outside to swim in their money - Scrooge Mcduck style.  Honestly, if something will overtake Blizzard's creation, it will be something that is so completely unlike WoW that they have no chance of emulating it.

What am I talking about, you ask?  Well, Blizzard simply has a fond habit of adapting features from other games into itself so it can stay current and not become outdated like Everquest has.  It devours and spawns.  It's like the Tyranids of gaming.  But, as of now with the Cataclysm expansion the game is as strong as ever and it would be silly to think that it would die.  Don't put your money on Rift.  Remember Age of Conan? Remember Warhammer Online? Remember Tabala Rasa? Remember Aion? I could of put many more, but I risk a sprawling list in my writing.  If I were to put my money on a game coming out soon to topple WoW, it would be Guild Wars 2, since it looks really good and has a lot of features that WoW can't really duplicate without making a different game.  Hell, if I were to put money on something, I'd say that Blizzard upcoming MMORPG won't make an impact against WoW.  That's how massive of a MMORPG it is.

So, with that out of the way, the reason I started about talking about Rift and World of Warcraft in the first place is because of a particular ad I've been coming across on the internet.  It's a Rift ad that shows it's game-play like usual but then it ends with the text - 'We're not in Azeroth anymore'

(No, that's not an actual ad, don't bother clicking it...)

That is the reason I brought all of this up.  This simply makes the 'WTF' alarms in my head start to buzz.  Um, Rift advertisers.. what the fuck are you doing? Seriously.  When I saw the ad I couldn't believe it, was that a joke? No, apparently not since you can see it in the trailers also.  If you're not familiar, Azeroth is the main world of WoW.  So, it's basically saying: "Hey, kid gloves off man. You tired of that pathetic WoW? Well this isn't it, this is a man's game.  Come play Rift!"  Well, no that's not the impression I get after seeing it.  I understand that advertisers need something simple and easy to get people latched on to, but you swung from creative to just completely shameless.  It just makes people think you're trying to rip it off and makes you look like a clone, as if you needed that going for you.  How about this - "Come to Rift, a world like no other you've played!" It's simple, because I just came up with it off the top of my head, but it gets the same message without making you actively look like you're wanting to attempt to steal WoW's player base.  It also gets a little legally grey and if WoW wanted to, they could probably take you to court on the matter.  It's like if Six Flags made a commercial showing all their exciting rides and ended with: "We're not in Disneyland anymore.." and then showed Mickey Mouse being impaled on a stick.

But you get my point.  You know, it's kind of funny to me that they said Azeroth in particular.  I'm sure some part of the WoW player base doesn't even know what Azeroth is which makes your ad fail in general.  But, World of Warcraft hasn't been in Azeroth since the original game - the two expansions after it were placed in Outland and Northrend respectively.  Players wanted to go back to Azeroth which is exactly why Cataclysm is placed back into it.  Which kind of makes the ad odd and ironic at the same time.

League of Legends - PROBLEMS WITH DISAPPEARING CONTENT, AND THE ARRIVAL OF CONTENT! (Part 1)

(The following is a very long rant that has been brewing in my mind for a while.  Please have consideration for your body and take frequent breaks and the occasional sip of juice.  You have been warned.)

This will probably begin to make me begin to rave but I really can’t help myself! This, This more than anything is probably the most aggravating thing that Riot Games does. What am I talking about you might ask? I'm talking about the removal of content they have made for the game!  Being a free to play - MMO like game, Riot Games must include content updates to the game periodically to keep the people playing the game interested.  These updates include more champions, skins, changes to the game and more.  But, with these usually needed changes come some that really make me scratch my head.  These are the changes the actually remove content from the game!  Completely!  What the hell, Riot?!  You’re a company that makes a game that is free to play and on top of that you’ve been using the two same basic maps for gameplay since the beginning of League of Legends, you really, seriously, completely, need to keep as much content in the game as possible.  As a content designer, I would think that giving players more options is a more successful strategy than inhibiting them from playing things in your game, whatever reasons you decide are necessary. 

(Please, keep in mind that I’m not complaining about various nerfs or buffs that CHANGE things about the game, just decisions that REMOVE content.)

Allow me to give some examples of what I’m exactly talking about, Shall we?

First and foremost: Items.  These are maybe the important things to talk about first because they are the content that has most been removed, although some items have been changed in such ways that make them used in less or meaningful ways than they were when originally created, its fine.  They’re still in the game.  The two items I’m talking about are Innervating Locket and Zhonya’s Ring.

The Locket was mid-expense item that did a lot of different things.  It gave you health and mana, health and mana regen aura that could also be used by surrounding team-mates, reduced cool downs by 10% and on use it regenerated your own personal supply of health and mana.  Once I found out about this item, I would often use it on all of my support champions and also some other champions because it gave you great laning power and a little bit of everything except damage, which was the payoff.  However, over the next couple of patches I saw a steady stream of changes and nerfs before finally just removing it all together.  Now, why the reason for such abrupt behavior?

Many believe it to be because of the release of Sona which is a support champion that could use it to wicked potential by combining it with the other auras she possesses to make her a very powerful healer and increase her buffing potential to allies.  But why remove it instead of just nerfing it into line with other aura/regen items?  Do you think it was because it was an underused item that they didn’t feel had a specific purpose? Not at all! If this was the case they would have removed a number of other items in the game that are a lot more specific and not incredibly useful to be honest.  Off the top of my head I can think of removing Tiamat, Wit’s End among a couple of other items could have been taken off because of similar thinking

(This does not mean that I am advocating the removal of MORE items in case you are reading this, Riot!) 

Since that time they have even made a new item that it more specific in use, being the cool-down reduction boots – Ionian Boots of Lucidity.  Personally, I think the reason it was removed because they just didn’t give it enough thought and made a hasty decision which resulted in removal.  Yes, I feel it was quite Lazy!  You may ask me, "Tombaugh,Why are you being so critical, surely this was a simple mistake that will be corrected in a soon to be released patch.” I would respond as such: First, please stop stuttering, I can't understand you.  Second of all.. Sorry, but I really don’t think so.  Yes; I am being critical because I’ve seen how careful Riot is for their changes and how tact they can be, but this one is just totally out of left-field.

(This amazing specimen of bad assery is Alistar, the Minotaur.  As seen here using his ground slam to burst from the hells of Mount Doom.  This is all in part to the useful necessity of Innervating Locket.)

(Unforunately, due to the removal of the Locket, What was left of Alistar became what you see in this picture.  Sad.  Unmotivated.  Feeble.)

(...)

 (Seriously, what the hell is up with that nose ring?  It must be painful to live as him.)

Zhonya’s Ring however is less of a dire change and as I stated earlier, I appreciate the care that Riot employed on this item, as opposed to the Innervating Locket.  It is an item that gives a mana defense bonuses and an increase to their ability damage.  The item was deemed too powerful because it gave casters a very defensive and powerful click ability and extremely large increases in damage, which made it ultimately the only item that mages would build for.  Instead of just removing it and calling it quits, they removed it and decided to change it into two items, putting the defense stats on one item, caster stats on the other.

This is a great idea, but it gives me concern because they just throw away the ring as a whole.  Sure, you can spend double the gold to buy both items, but that makes you cripple your champion by taking up an extra slot.  Why not just allow you to combine both items back into Zhonya’s Ring for a considerable gold cost? Now there’s an idea, that doesn’t force every heavy AP champion to buy it to be good but doesn’t remove the option to allow you to.  More options are better and more fun, right?

(Yes, I have even more to say about this issue, look forward to the second part, soon.)