This past weekend I gave a few more hours of time to playing the Star Trek Online open beta. While I have enjoyed some parts of the game, there is an uncanny valley between the game Cryptic is offering and the Trek game I would love.
Anyhow, there are a few things I encountered over the course of my playing that left a bruise when I woke up today. I felt these were worth documenting so I can recall them later and see how or if they changed over time.
Of course my standard beta disclaimer applies:
I know beta issues are not always reflective of the released game. I get that, but that has zero impact on me recording my experiences and watching to see how things end up.
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MrAnderson Games, Star Trek Online, beta beta, Games, MMO, STO
There were a few big things that caught my attention this weekend.
Champions part 4
There have been some significant changes in Champion Online over the course of the last four days. First it appears that they fixed the teleport Travel Power bug, which makes it usable. Yay. Second there have been many quest bugs addressed, along with some passes on balance, and corrections to UI issues.
Those were all fairly welcome, but there have been two changes, which in some ways baffle me. They adjusted the experience point curve lowering quest reward rates and increases xp needed to level. The result is much slower leveling, which I guess they needed to do a little bit but this was a bit harsh. Apparently this was just a test and they “plan” to make further adjustments, I sure hope they do. Leveling was a bit too fast, but now its WAY to slow.
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MrAnderson Uncategorized beta, Champions Online, Games, MMO, SWTOR, World of Warcraft
Day 3
Again with Costumes
I started day three of the open beta with an attempt at recreating another one of my City of Heroes characters. It was… interesting. I find in many ways the Champions Costume editor to offer a broader variety of piece types, while at the same time feeling as though it is missing many of the pieces that were in CoH at launch which I have come to expect.
The good news is CO looks to have the system in place to add new pieces, patterns, difuses, emblems, etc. easily.
The bad news I suspect there will be few free additions of such pieces, instead I suspect most will be offered by DLC.
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MrAnderson Champions Online, Games, beta beta, Champions Online, Games, MMO
Day 2 Continued: Costumes
The champions character / costume creator has a lot of options, but it also has some quirks I just don’t understand.
For example I select Robotic with both arms as my overall chest type, then under chest and arms I have several “material” options; cloth tight, leather tight, metal tight, and cyborg specific. Those all open up other options. Great, I continue on picking options , but then decide I only want one arm to be robotic.
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MrAnderson Champions Online, Games, beta beta, Champions Online, Games, MMO
Day 1
A patching nightmare. While I want to take Cryptic’s response at face value, I know how much spin happens in the industry; particularly when something bad happens.  The good news it happened in the beta, and they have a couple of weeks to try and fix it.
Yes the latest installer from Fileplanet will work without patching now, but that just bought Cryptic some time. They need to address the real problems before launch.
Day 2 – quick character creation
I finally get to get in and play again.
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MrAnderson Champions Online, Games, beta beta, Champions Online, Games, MMO
Champions Online
Oops, I did mention it though I only do so because I waited until after the NDA dropped to publish this.
Some notes:
This is not a review or even a preview.
It is simply practically a stream of consciousness list of my thoughts as I took a look at the game.
The list is long and covers a few play sessions.
One of the reasons I created this blog was for me to keep a record of my thoughts on games I played. Particularly my first impressions so I need to make sure and record my thoughts as quickly as I can after my initial experiences of a game, or else they will start to fade.
Note on beta thoughts
I have played lots of games that were in development, and alpha, betas, and preview stages, I know how much things can change from build to build. I get that. I have first hand seen a programmer make a few changes and have a games FPS jump way up. I have seen options added, art tweaked, sound levels adjusted, on and on.
So please don’t tell me “Its beta, live with it.”   I know its a beta, but these are my impressions of the game at this time. When the game is release I will post again and I will applaud them on changes.
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MrAnderson Champions Online, Games, beta beta, Champions Online, Games, MMO
Weekend Gaming
While this weekend I spent most of my gaming time in wow, I did mange to squeeze out a little non-wow gaming. I started with Brother’s in Arms: Hell’s Highway; why have I not played this before?  This game feels like a cake made by mixing some FPS with a puzzle game with a handful of story. I have a few issues with it, but over all I am really enjoying the experience.
I also played a bit of a ‘super’ mmo beta, that I shall not yet mention. I do have a post post with some thoughts that I will post at some point.
And I also played a tiny bit of EQ2, right before my trial account ran out. I had fun. No really, I enjoyed the game and if it did not have a monthly fee I would probably keep playing it a bit here and there.  Alas it does have a fee, and I already am invested in my friends and characters of WoW.  Though if I my friends and I ever leave wow, and EQ2 is still kicking, I could see trying to convince them to come play.
WoW Raiding Update
This weekend our raiding group was a bit odd, in that we were short several of our regulars. This left us scrambling to fill some DPS slots, which we eventually did but it was a bit on the stressful side getting it all together.  How did we end up doing? Read more…
MrAnderson Games, World of Warcraft, beta beta, EQ2, Games, MMO, Raiding, World of Warcraft